Today it was Sledge, a hospital orderly from northern Alabama who captured lightning with his signature song, and follow-up hits including Warm and Tender Love, Take Time to Know Her and Out of ...

Sledge was an icon of the "Muscle Shoals sound," named for the city near his hometown known since the 1960s for local recording studios where hits that shaped American pop music were recorded.

There were other hits, until his producers retired in 1974 just as soul music was going priapic, but the first cut was always the deepest. When I met Sledge in 1994 he had his first new album out in ...

Percy Sledge, who soared from part-time singer and hospital orderly to lasting fame with his aching, forlorn performance on the classic "When a Man Loves a Woman," died Tuesday in Louisiana. He ...

Musician Dan Penn co-wrote numerous Southern soul classics, including Percy Sledge's 'Out of Left Field' and Aretha Franklin's 'Do Right Woman, Do Right Man.' PROVIDED PHOTO BY MIKE FICKEL/WINGED ...

Despite having other hits Sledge became known for "When a Man Loves a Woman." It was the first No. 1 hit from Muscle Shoals, and the first gold record for Atlantic Records.