FILE - In this March 29, 2016 file photo, producer and label owner Fred Foster attends the announcement of the Country Music Hall of Fame inductees in Nashville, Tenn. Foster, who produced some of Roy Orbison’s most iconic records and was the first to produce records from Kris Kristofferson and Dolly Parton, has died at the age of 87. His publicist, Martha Moore, said Foster died Wednesday, Feb. 20, 2019 in Nashville. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey, File)

Nashville producer Fred Foster, who produced some of Roy Orbison's most popular records and was the first to produce records from Kris Kristofferson and Dolly Parton, has died. He was 87.

His publicist, Martha Moore, said Foster died Wednesday in Nashville, and that a memorial service will be held later.

Born in 1931 in North Carolina, Foster helped launch the careers of many hit country artists and was a major supporter of some of Nashville's biggest songwriters.

In the 1960s, he moved his record label, Monument Records, from Washington, D.C., to Nashville. Foster was the first to see the potential in a young singer-songwriter from East Tennessee named Dolly and got her songs cut by other artists, as well as recording and releasing her own material. But it wasn't until she started appearing on Porter Wagoner's TV show that she became popular.

"It's a gift, being able to sense something unique in somebody, and that's what I aimed for, always," said Foster in 2007. "Anybody that dropped a needle on a groove of a Monument record, I wanted them to immediately know, 'Oh, that's Dolly Parton,' or 'That's Roy Orbison.' It had to be unique."

Foster also owned a publishing company, Combine Music, and Kristofferson was one of his hires, a Texas-born athlete and Army veteran who loved William Blake. He had been trying to break through as a songwriter, even working as a janitor in a Music Row recording studio. After hearing some of his songs, Foster said he would only hire Kristofferson as a songwriter if he also signed a record deal.

"He was so intelligent, so gifted, so talented and he didn't sound like anybody I had ever heard," Foster told The Associated Press in 2016.

Foster is credited as co-writer on Kristofferson's hit song, "Me and Bobby McGee." Foster came up with the idea to name a song after a female secretary in his building, whose name was Bobbie McKee. Kristofferson told the magazine "Performing Songwriter" that he was inspired to write the lyrics about a man and woman on the road together after watching the Frederico Fellini film, "La Strada."

Janis Joplin, who had a close relationship with Kristofferson, changed the lyrics to make Bobby McGee a man and cut her version just days before she died in 1970 from a drug overdose. The recording became a posthumous No. 1 hit for Joplin.

In the early 1960s, Foster helped Roy Orbison become an international star with his recordings on Monument. Orbison was an unlikely star with his falsetto and penchant for wearing dark sunglasses. His singles on Monument were dark and emotional, backed by soaring strings and doo-wop backing vocals. Some of the classic Orbison songs released by Monument include "Only the Lonely," ''Oh, Pretty Woman," and "Crying."

Foster continued to work as a producer throughout his life, never really slowing down. At 85, he worked on a Ray Price tribute album for Willie Nelson, called "For the Good Times," that was released in 2016.

"If I don't know more at 85 than I did at 75, I am not learning very fast, am I?" Foster said then. "I think I'm probably a better producer today than I have ever been."

News from © The Associated Press, 2019