Soul singer Percy Sledge dies at 74 after cancer battle

Percy Sledge, who recorded the classic 1966 soul ballad 'When A Man Loves A Woman', has died at the age of 74.

William Clark, coroner for East Baton Rouge, Louisiana, confirmed that Sledge died early on Tuesday.

Sledge learned his trade singing in the cotton fields of his native Alabama. He got to number four with the ballad in May 1966 and saw it do even better in 1987 when a reissue got to number two after it featured in an advert for Levi’s jeans.

Speaking about his early years in the south, Sledge told a documentary: “I was a little guy working in the fields chopping cotton singing to the older people in the field and they would always say that one day my voice would be heard all over the world but I never thought that would happen.”

Sledge was working as a hospital orderly, where he would sing to his patients, when he played a college gig and impressed a producer with the song that would become his first — and most famous — release.

He said the song, which became part of the blueprint for southern soul, had been with him a long time telling the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame: “I hummed it all my life, even when I was picking and chopping cotton in the fields.”

Sledge’s first recording took him from hospital orderly to a long touring career averaging 100 performances a year and an induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2005.

Between 1966 and 1968, Sledge used his forlorn vocal style to record a series of southern soul standards.

In later years, he continued to be an in-demand performer in the US and Europe as 'When A Man Loves A Woman' kept popping up in movies including 'The Big Chill' and 'The Crying Game'.