United Artists Records was a record label founded by Max E. Youngstein of United Artists in 1957 initially to distribute records of its movie soundtracks, though it soon branched out into recording music of a number of different genres.

In 1959, United Artists released Forest of the Amazons, a cantata by Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos adapted from the music he composed for MGM's Green Mansions, with the composer conducting the Symphony of the Air. Brazilian soprano Bidu Sayao was the featured soloist on the unusual recording, which was released on both LP and reel-to-reel tape.

Besides the movie soundtracks and the few classical releases, UA had quite a few rock 'n roll and r&b hits from 1959 (and into the 1960s) with hits by The Clovers, Marv Johnson, The Falcons, The Exciters, Patty Duke, Bobby Goldsboro, and later Manfred Mann and The Easybeats. Berry Gordy placed a number of early Motown acts with UA including Marv Johnson and Eddie Holland in 1959. UA signed Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller after they left Atlantic to produce artists. They had hits with The Exciters, The Clovers, as well as Mike Clifford.

United Artists Corporation (UA) is an American film studio. The original studio of that name was founded in 1919 by D. W. Griffith, Charles Chaplin, Mary Pickford, and Douglas Fairbanks.

The current United Artists formed in November 2006 under a partnership between producer/actor Tom Cruise and his production partner, Paula Wagner, and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., an MGM company. Paula Wagner left the studio on August 14, 2008. Cruise owned a small stake in the studio until late 2011. It is now a fully owned subsidiary of MGM, which itself is owned by MGM Holdings.

UA was incorporated as a joint venture on February 5, 1919, by four of the leading figures in early Hollywood: Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and D. W. Griffith. Each held a 20% stake, with the remaining 20% held by lawyer William Gibbs McAdoo. The idea for the venture originated with Fairbanks, Chaplin, Pickford, and cowboy star William S. Hart a year earlier as they were traveling around the U.S. selling Liberty bonds to help the World War I effort. Already veterans of Hollywood, the four film stars began to talk of forming their own company to better control their own work as well as their futures.

Andrew Youakim, performing as Andy Kim, is a Lebanese Canadian pop rock singer and songwriter. He grew up in Montreal, Quebec in Canada. Kim is known for a number of hit singles that he released in the late 1960s and early 1970s such as "Rock Me Gently", which topped the US singles charts. In 1968, he co-wrote "Sugar, Sugar" for The Archies. The song was No. 1 for four weeks and in 1969 was certified "Record of the Year" by the RIAA.

Kim has also recorded under the stage name Baron Longfellow since the mid 1980s or just as Longfellow in the early 1990s.

Andy Kim was born in Montreal, Quebec. The date of his birth has been reported variably as either 5 December 1946 as cited by VH1, United Press International, and Rolling Stone, or 5 December 1952 as cited by the Allmusic and Billboard Books. Various published interviews with Kim from the mid-1970s support the 1946 dating, while Kim's current biography on his official website offers no specific year of birth.

He is the third of four sons of Lebanese immigrants. He moved to New York at age 16 to pursue a career in music.

Johnny Rivers (born John Henry Ramistella, November 7, 1942, New York City) is an American rock and roll singer, songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. His styles include folk songs, blues, and revivals of old-time rock 'n' roll songs and some original material. Rivers's greatest success came in the mid- to late-1960s with a string of hit songs (including the #1 hit "Poor Side of Town", "Summer Rain", and "Secret Agent Man"), but he has continued to record and perform to the present.

The Ramistella family moved from New York to Baton Rouge, Louisiana when Johnny's father lost his job while Johnny was still young. Without any formal music lessons, he began playing guitar, which he learned from his father and uncle, at the age of eight, and was influenced by the distinctive music of Louisiana. While in junior high school he started sitting in with a band called The Rockets led by Dick Holler who later wrote a number of songs including "Abraham, Martin and John" and "Snoopy vs. The Red Baron".

Donald "Don" McLean (born October 2, 1945, New Rochelle, New York) is an American singer-songwriter. He is most famous for the 1971 album American Pie, containing the renowned songs "American Pie" and "Vincent".

Both McLean's grandfather and father were also named Donald McLean. The Buccis, the family of McLean's mother, Elizabeth, came from Abruzzo in central Italy. They left Italy and settled in Port Chester, New York, at the end of the 19th century. He has other extended family in Los Angeles and Boston.

As a teenager, McLean became interested in folk music, particularly the Weavers' 1955 recording At Carnegie Hall. Childhood asthma meant that McLean missed long periods of school, particularly music lessons, and although he slipped back in his studies, his love of music was allowed to flourish. He often performed shows for family and friends. By age 16 he had bought his first guitar (a Harmony acoustic archtop with a sunburst finish) and begun making contacts in the music business, becoming friends with folk singer Erik Darling, a latter-day member of the Weavers. McLean recorded his first studio sessions (with singer Lisa Kindred) while still in prep school.