The Al Abrams collection contains scrapbooks, correspondence, press releases, photographs, and memoirs detailing Abrams' work as a publicist and press agent for Detroit's Motown and for Stax Records in Memphis. The collection is valuable for its documentation of Motown in the period of the early to mid-1960s when this Detroit company was beginning its great string of record successes. Abrams was a great collector of press and other materials about the artists who worked for Motown and Stax-Volt.
The Abrams collection measures two linear feet and four oversize volumes whose contents have been foldered. The collection has been arranged into the following series: Motown Record Company, Stax Record Company, Al Abrams Associates, Miscellaneous, Visual Materials, and Scrapbooks.
Al Abrams was a press agent/public relations consultant for Motown records during its early formative period, roughly 1964 to 1966. In 1959, having worked as a trainee in the mailroom of Detroit's McCann-Erickson Advertising Agency, Abrams signed on as the first employee of Berry Gordy's Rayber Music Writing and Recording Company. Abrams, though a young man at the time, here began developing skills needed to be a publicist within the music business. He knew that for a record to succeed it must be played on the radio. Abrams got to know all of the important Detroit area DJs and participated in publicity stunts to make known artists and their records.
Abrams stayed with Rayber for a time then left to follow other opportunities. In 1964, he returned to Gordy and his Motown company which was still a small struggling firm. He stayed with Motown for two years handling the press relations first for singer Mary Wells then for the Supremes. During this period, Motown and its stable of singers and musical groups, such as the Supremes, began its string of great successes. In 1966 Abrams left Motown to form his own public relations firm - Al Abrams Associates - where he worked as public relations consultant for the Stax Record Company, a Memphis-based firm, and Stax-Volt recording artists such as Otis Redding. Following Redding's tragic death, Abrams ended his association with Stax-Volt in 1968 to work independently. Florence Ballard who had left the Supremes and was no longer working for Motown became his biggest client. He also did press work for Invictus Records based in Detroit and worked with James Brown, Aretha Franklin, and many other artists.
