Phil Spector, Music Producer Known for the ‘Wall of Sound,’ Dies at 81 - The New York Times

Phil Spector, one of the most influential and successful record producers in rock ’n’ roll, who generated a string of hits in the early 1960s defined by the lavish instrumental treatment known as the wall of sound, but whose life was upended when he was sentenced to prison for the murder of a woman at his home, died on Saturday.

With the Teddy Bears, a group he formed with two school friends, he recorded the dreamy ballad “To Know Him Is to Love Him.” Released in August 1958, it sold more than a million records after the group appeared on the popular TV show “American Bandstand,” with Mr.

After learning the ropes as a record producer, Mr.

Spector single-handedly created the image of the record producer as auteur, a creative force equal to or even greater than his artists, with an instantly identifiable aural brand.

“There were songwriter-producers before him, but no one did the whole thing like Phil,” the songwriter and producer Jerry Leiber told Rolling Stone in 2005.

Spector served a brief but crucial apprenticeship together at Atlantic Records.

Spector told The Evening Standard of London in 1964.

Spector “the biggest inspiration in my entire life.” To John Lennon, he was “the greatest record producer ever.”.

(Mr. Spector hated his first name and went by Phil, adding an “l” to “Philip” as well.) The epitaph on his father’s tombstone, “To Know Him Was to Love Him,” found its way into Mr.

His mother, Bertha, moved him and his sister, Shirley, to Los Angeles, where Bertha Spector worked as a seamstress and later a bookkeeper.

Spector to work with the two men at Atlantic Records, where their use of strings and heavy instrumentation became part of his repertoire.

He also produced two hit records on other labels, “Corinna, Corinna,” by Ray Peterson, and “Pretty Little Angel Eyes,” by Curtis Lee, a bland love song that he souped up by inserting the Halos, a Bronx doo-wop group, as backup.

Spector worked with the Paris Sisters, a local trio, producing “I Love How You Love Me,” a feathery, echo-laden ballad with silky strings that rose to No.

Spector struck gold when he began working with the Crystals, a New York group that he signed to Philles Records, a label that he and the record executive Lester Sill created in 1961, fusing their first names.

Spector was keen to have the Crystals record the Gene Pitney composition “He’s a Rebel” immediately.

To speed things along, he enlisted the Blossoms, a well-known Los Angeles backup group, and recorded them under the Crystals name, with Darlene Wright (whose last name he changed to Love) on lead.

Spector withdrew it from sale, and it sank without a trace.

Spector surpassed himself when he put Tina Turner in the studio in 1966 to record “River Deep, Mountain High,” which employed 21 musicians and an equal number of backup vocalists.

Spector withdrew from the music business for several years and entered a decades-long decline marked by erratic behavior, often involving his extensive handgun collection, and heavy drinking.

Lennon, he produced “Imagine” and, in part, “John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band” and “Rock ’n’ Roll.” He worked with Mr.

“Let It Be” received mixed reviews and was thoroughly repudiated by Paul McCartney, who hated the lush choirs and heavy orchestration, especially on “The Long and Winding Road.” At his instigation, Apple Records produced a de-Spectorized version of the record, released in 2003 as “Let It Be.

Spector produced the Ramones’ album “End of the Century” and Leonard Cohen’s “Death of a Ladies’ Man.” Neither album was successful.

A boxed set of his recordings from 1968 to 1969, “Phil Spector: Back to Mono,” was released by Phil Spector Records in 1991.

Spector, after drinking heavily, drove to his home in Alhambra, Calif., with Lana Clarkson, a struggling actress he had just met at the House of Blues, where she worked as a hostess.

“He added a drama to music that I don’t think existed before him,” the record producer Jimmy Iovine told Rolling Stone in 1990