Pierre Cossette

In his two-hour Archive interview, Pierre Cossette (1923-2009) talks about his early career as an agent at MCA, where he quickly gained a reputation for booking clients at colleges across the country. He describes his relationship with agency head Lew Wasserman and shares how Wasserman assigned him to booking clubs in Las Vegas. He speaks about starting his own record label with Lou Adler (and others) called Dunhill records and talks of independently representing musical talents, like Ann-Margret and Jose Feliciano, and booking them on The Andy Williams Show. He outlines his long association as executive-producer of The Grammys from 1971-2005. Cossette relates behind-the-scenes stories about the show, including when host Kenny Rogers came down with laryngitis, his early difficulties booking Billy Joel, and his objection to opening one of The Grammys shows with Alicia Keys. He defines his philosophy of producing and what abilities made him a successful producer. Bonnie Datt conducted the interview on June 4, 2008 in Los Angeles, California.