In the fractured English of the pop-music world, "payola" is whatever the guy or doll in search of a hit slips to the guy or doll who can make one. Performers, writers and publishers and their song pluggers pass payola to A & R (artists and repertory) chiefs, who decide what the record companies will record; the companies, in turn, spread payola around to selected disk jockeys. If the custom is fully understood in the trade, it is rarely discussed outside it. But last week Singer Frank Sinatra fired a telegram from Hollywood (a town with its own brand of payola)...
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