MUSIC MAN

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Howaard Hertz in his Bloomfield Hills office: "I was always into music."

was 6 years old, but maybe it was ear-
lier when I heard the theme song
from the TV show Davy Crockett."
No matter what song first grabbed
his attention, Hertz says,. "I was
always into music." In fact, he says,
from ages 6-18 he sang every song
and knew every word of every song in
the Top 40.
Born in Canada in 1949, he grew
up in Detroit and developed his
musical consciousness in the early
1960s. He now lives in Farmington
Hills with his wife, Wendy.
"I had a good voice," he notes,
though he never pursued music seri-
ously or joined a band. He did, how-
ever, sing with a three-part harmony
group for patients at Children's
Hospital of Michigan, and enjoyed
leading children's services each
Shabbat at the former Congregation
Beth Aaron. Today, he is a member of
Temple Kol Ami, where he enjoys
Rabbi Norman' Roman's guitar play-
ing during services..
But music wasn't the only area
where Hertz was vocal: "I think I
ended up in law because I used to
argue with my teachers and they'd
say, 'You're going to be a lawyer.'
Hertz had an interest in psychology
and became a "big brother" in a
diversion program for kids with a
variety of problems. And it was his

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interest in kids and psychology that
led him to law school at Wayne State
University.
"One day I walked into the
Juvenile Defenders office and told
them I was going to work for them,"
he recalls. They needed the help and
gave Hertz a start as a law clerk, but
soon depended on him for casework.
So he found himself in court.
As his law career was developing,
he remained a music enthusiast. In
1976, the two interests converged.

Into The Business

When a friend who was a local singer
and songwriter was offered a publish-
ing contract, he asked Hertz for
advice.
"I didn't know anything about it,"
admits Hertz, but he read a book
about the music business and made
revisions to the contract.
The publisher, Joel Martin, who
was just 18 years old, was impressed
that someone actually paid enough
attention to the contract to make
changes, and he asked Hertz to work
with him.
The successful collaboration result-
ed in Martin using his connections in
the music industry to refer musicians
to Hertz.
"The music angle just started to

grow," Hertz says. "There were not
many attorneys working in that area."
Decades later the Martin connec-
tion led to Hertz's association with
one of his most famous clients, a
local boy named Marshall Mathers,
who has made it huge as Eminem.
In 1979, Hertz and fellow WSU
law student Brad Schram formed
their own law firm. A few years later,.
they added their first law clerk, Gary
Saretsky, as a partner and today the
firm in Bloomfield Hills has almost
30 attorneys.
When Hertz's friend Norty Stern, a
financial planner who lives in
Farmington Hills, started goefie
Records in 1981, he called oiri-lertz
for assistance. When Stern's label was
sold to Atlantic Records, Hertz was
introduced to his first major music
label and the deals started coming.
He helped Atlantic sign classic
blues artist and longtime Detroiter
Sippie Wallace in 1982, resulting in
the album Sippie, which was nomi-
nated for a Grammy Award. It was
the first time Hertz attended the •
Grammy ceremony; the second was
in 2000 when Eminem sang "Stan"
with Elton John.
As his practice grows, Hertz
remains a major promoter of the
Detroit music scene.
Just about six years ago, I saw that