Variety says...

Jim Stewart, who founded what became the Stax Records label and produced some of the great soul records of the 1960s, died Monday at age 92. A cause of death was not released.

Stewart co-founded the iconic, Memphis-based Black music label in 1957 and ran it, with eventual help from future figurehead Al Bell, until the early 1970s, when he sold out his interest. Along the way, he was instrumental in discovering and/or releasing records from such greats as Sam and Dave, Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas, the Staple Singers, Wilson Pickett and Booker T. and the MG’s, producing and especially engineering many of these singles himself.

The label owner and producer was a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, having been inducted in 2002 by two of the musicians he made famous, Sam Moore and Steve Cropper. He was given the hall’s Ahmet Ertegun Award for his pioneering efforts.

Stewart freely admitted he knew little about Black music prior to Stax, and indeed, what was known as Satellite Records when the label was founded in 1957 started out with a country music emphasis. But he not only recognized the importance of R&B a few years into the company’s run but became actively involved in its direction and recordings as it soon defined the “Memphis sound” that enthralled that generation and many more to come.