#big star

Terry Manning, the man behind some of your favorite recordings.

At home I had all these Satellite and Stax records that I'd been playing that said, "926 E. McLemore, Memphis, Tennessee" on the bottom of them, on the little curve. So one day I just got on a bus with a map and found the place, and there it was, a big old movie theatre with the Stax logo on the marquee.

I had a guitar in my hand, my '52 Telecaster (still have it), and walked up to the door and thought, "This is the record company, here I go to make records!" [laughter] I went up to that entrance, and went in and there was a secretary there. I think I was fifteen, and I explained that I had come to get a job, to sing, play, write, produce, engineer — whatever they needed I could do it all.