From the MCRFB NEWS archive: 1968
WEXLER, ATLANTIC RECORDS SIGN ARETHA TO NEW LONG-TERM RECORD DEAL
NEW YORK — Aretha Franklin and Atlantic Records have negotiated a new contract, despite her original contract with the label had several years left open before it would have expired contractually. At a luncheon at the Hotel St. Regis last Thursday, April 25, the Atlantic organization were on hand to celebrate her new deal and her imminent departure on her first European concert tour.
Jerry Wexler, Atlantic’s executive vice-president, said that Miss Franklin will receive one of the largest guarantee ever given to any recording star but to reveal the sum would be in “gross taste.”
Miss Franklin signed with Atlantic Records in October, 1966, and her first single was issued in February, 1967. Since then she has had five singles releases that have sold more than 1 million copies, including an album that has garnered sales of over $1 million. Over the past year she has swept virtually every award in the record industry.
Miss Franklin’s European tour begins in Rotterdam, Sunday, May 5 and winds up in Stockholm on Thursday, May 9. END
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(Information and news source: Billboard; May 4, 1968)
