Alex Cooley, longtime concert promoter and ‘unofficial mayor of Atlanta music,’ has died at 74
Posted Dec 2, 2015 04:00:15 PM.
Last Updated Dec 2, 2015 04:40:25 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
ATLANTA – A former business partner says concert promoter Alex Cooley, known as the “unofficial mayor of Atlanta music” who helped bring top performers to music festivals in Georgia, has died.
Peter Conlon says Cooley died Tuesday at a rental home in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. He was 74.
Cooley promoted rock and roll shows in Atlanta, where he was born and raised and in Georgia. He made a splash in the music scene in 1969 with the Atlanta International Pop Festival, and an even bigger 1970 festival.
The events featured top acts including Janis Joplin, Led Zeppelin, the Allman Brothers Band, The Jimi Hendrix Experience and B.B. King.
Cooley and Conlon helped promote the inaugural Music Midtown in 1994. Cooley was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 1987.
