Memphis manager Herbie O’Mell dies at 82
Talent manager, event promoter, nightclub owner, casino executive, and all-around show business dealmaker, Herbie O’Mell once hailed as “The Ed Sullivan of the Mid-South” has died.
An affable figure whose shadow cut across more than 65 years of Memphis entertainment history, O’Mell, 82, died Tuesday at Baptist Memorial Hospital after several weeks in poor health after a pair of small strokes and an ulcer surgery. His family confirmed O’Mell’s passing.
A former chairman of the Memphis & Shelby County Film & Television Commission, a founding member of the local Grammy chapter, a longtime music manager (who worked with Ronnie Millsap and Jerry Lee Lewis, among others), and a local club owner, O’Mell was a born wheeler-dealer with a genuine, gregarious manner.
“Herbie was the sweetest, most sincere person that I’ve ever met,” said Grammy-winning engineer and Royal Studios owner Lawrence “Boo” Mitchell. “He’s one of the great mentors and legacies of Memphis music – not just music, but our whole entertainment scene. Herbie was always a champion of Memphis”
“Herbie was the most connected guy in every room, and the last one you’d pick as such,” said Memphis music historian and author Robert Gordon. “He didn’t have airs, never shouted, was completely approachable. He always had a good word, was happy to help with any project.”
In a 1993 profile in The Commercial Appeal, O’Mell noted that his varied career was reminiscent of his paternal grandfather, a Russian Jew who immigrated to Memphis as a cobbler and, later, a liquor store owner on South Main.
In Russia, the family name had been Maltik, but that changed somewhat accidentally in the Bluff City. ”[My grandfather] didn’t read or write English,” O’Mell recalled. “He hired an Irish painter to paint the front of his store, and the Irishman went with him to get a bank loan. Somehow when he got the loan he also got the Irishman’s name.”
O’Mell’s father, William O’Mell, owned Dixie Loan and Luggage, a pawn shop and leather goods store. But young Herbie was drawn more to show business than shop keeping.
He got his start in music promotion after graduating from Central High School. Majoring in marketing at Memphis State University, O’Mell paid his tuition by promoting dances at the old Chisca Hotel.
”I had Elvis Presley playing there for $100 a night before he cut his first record,” O’Mell said. “They liked him, but weren’t wild about him then.”
O’Mell met Presley through mutual friend George Klein, a member of O’Mell’s fraternity at Memphis State. Klein and O’Mell remained close through the decades. In recent years, O’Mell served as executive producer of Klein’s TV talk show “Memphis Sounds.” O’Mell was often backstage, greeting guests with his usual brand of bonhomie.
After graduating from college, O’Mell worked briefly in the construction business, but ultimately found himself pulled toward show business once again, landing a recurring role on the TV show “Route 66.”
“I was in [living in] Memphis, but had traveled around the country and won a twist contest in New York City,” said O’Mell. “There was an article about it, and [‘Route 66’ writer/producer] Stirling Silliphant saw it in the paper and contacted me.”
O’Mell worked on the show during the 1962-63 season, appearing in the three episodes shot in Memphis. ”I never had a line,” he recalled. “They said I couldn’t even say ‘uh-huh’ without a Southern accent.”
Silliphant would later hire O’Mell as movie location scout for a film adaptation of William Faulkner’s “The Reivers,” starring Steve McQueen. He also scouted for director William Wyler’s final feature “The Liberation of L.B. Jones.”
”I thought I was the big Southern location scout of all time,” says O’Mell, who later went on to serve 25 years as a member of the Memphis and Shelby County Film & Television Commission, six as chairman.
Arguably, O’Mell’s biggest success came as a nightclub owner and operator, starting with The Penthouse.
In the late ‘60s, O’Mell re-opened a bankrupt club in Midtown, just off Avalon and Poplar, called T.J.’s. In the fall of ‘68 he hired a blind singer from Georgia named Ronnie Milsap for a trial run of shows.
“We played two weeks, and it went over so well that Herbie said, ‘This is where you need to play. You guys are the house band,’” remembered Milsap in a 2007 interview.
With O’Mell signing on as his manager, T.J.’s became Milsap’s home base.
“It was the hottest club in Memphis back then,” recalled O’Mell. “We couldn’t even serve liquor by the drink back then – that was before they passed the law letting you do that. So you had to bring your own bottle, and we’d serve the setups or mix it for you.”
T.J.’s soon became a wild and wildly popular hangout for local musicians and a regular post-show spot for touring acts, many of whom would sit in with Milsap.
“I’d come off stage and get me a little scotch and soda or something and sit down and here’s John Fogerty, or Leon Russell, or Isaac Hayes,” Milsap would note. “Sometimes the MGs would come over and sit in, sometimes it’d be Three Dog Night. “
O’Mell helped manage Milsap to his first recording contract, launching his Grammy- winning and multi-million album-selling career.
In the ‘70s, O’Mell also served as business manager for legendary music producers Chips Moman, Dan Penn and Jim Dickinson.
He made a valiant attempt to manage the affairs of Jerry Lee Lewis during his tax troubles, and even had his own music publishing company – which claimed at least one Elvis Presley song in its catalog, though it was one of the King’s less-popular numbers.
”It’s called ‘If You Talk In Your Sleep, Don’t Mention My Name.’ I’d hate to try to feed my family on any royalties from it,” O’Mell would joke.
Eventually, O’Mell would move onto the casino business, recruiting local high-rollers for trips to Las Vegas, the Caribbean, Monte Carlo and Atlantic City. On one junket, he met his future wife, Laura. The couple married in 1980 and started a family and O’Mell would go on to serve as an executive for the Harrah’s and Splash casinos.
If there was a major entertainment happening in Memphis over the last 40 years, O’Mell was likely involved – whether executive producing the “Class of ‘55” album featuring Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison and Carl Perkins, or helping promote the 1999 Mike Tyson fight at the Pyramid.
“Herbie was a master at ‘doin’ bidness,’ which is business that doesn’t feel like business,” Gordon said. “Negotiations were casual, often conducted by exchanging stories and jokes. But when all was said and done, so was the deal he wanted. For movies, for albums, for Mike Tyson or Ronnie Milsap—Herbie took care of bidness.”
O’Mell is survived by his wife Laura, and his sons, Brandon and Michael.
A visitation for O’Mell will be held at Memorial Park Funeral Home and Cemetery (5668 Poplar Ave.) from 5 to 7 p.m. Sunday.
The funeral will take place Monday, also at Memorial Park, with a gathering at 1 p.m. and services at 2 p.m.