Skip to main content Trending on Billboard A genuine Canadian music business legend has died.

Montreal concert promoter, record producer and label head Donald K.

Tarlton, more commonly known as Donald K.

Donald, has passed at the age of 82.

The news was confirmed yesterday (April 13) by CTV News and other sources.

Gone But Not Forgotten: Musicians We Lost in 2026 Over six decades, Tarlton had a huge impact on the live music scene in Montreal and beyond.

He was a major inspiration to many of Canada’s biggest promoters, worked with legends like The Rolling Stones and Janis Joplin, and helped launch many influential record labels including Aquarius Records, Tacca Music and Last Gang.

The Montreal-born Tarlton attended Sir George Williams University (now Concordia University) and an interest in entertainment promotion began in his youth.

In 1966, Tarlton founded Donald K.

Donald Productions, a concert promotion and booking company that had a huge impact on the live music scene in Montreal and beyond.

A major career boost for Tarlton came along in the form of Janis Joplin in 1968.

A 2011 feature in The Montreal Gazette recalled “an accident backstage at the old Montreal Forum one night in 1968 when rock legend Janis Joplin puked all over the shoes of Tarlton’s mentor, renowned local promoter Sam Gesser.

“It was the beginning of the rock’n’roll era and Sam had a hard time relating with the culture,” Tarlton told a Gazette journalist many years later.

“He hired me as the stage manager.

Janis was drunk and threw up all over his shoes.

Sam was horrified, looked at me and said, ‘Donald, you can take over all the rock stuff.’ And that was it.

I became the rock promoter of Montreal.” With the Montreal Forum his key venue, Tarlton promoted thousands of concerts there and in other area venues in the following decades.

Gordon Anderson, Promotion Executive Who Helped Power CBS Records’ Golden Run, Dies at 79 Marc Schneider In 1969, Tarlton ventured into the record business as co-founder of independent label Aquarius Records, alongside Terry Flood, Bob Lemm, Dan Lazare and Jack Lazare.

Flood served as label president of the label from its beginning in 1969 until 1990 and he and Tarlton would grow Aquarius into one of Canada’s most important independent record labels.

It found major commercial success with such artists as April Wine (managed by Flood), Corey Hart and Sass Jordan and, later, Sum 41.

Canadian Encyclopedia notes that “Under Flood’s direction as president, Aquarius had issued more than 55 albums by 1990, most the work of Quebec-based anglophone rock artists.

April Wine has been its most productive act, issuing some 19 albums 1971-89, while Corey Hart’s The Boy in the Box (1985) has been its most successful release, selling more than one million copies in Canada.

The Aquarius roster also has included Roger Doucet, Freedom North, Lewis Furey, Myles Goodwyn, the Guess Who, Sass Jordan, Mindstorm, Moonquake, Morse Code, Peter Pringle, Walter Rossi, Sword, Tchukon and Teaze.

Distribution of Aquarius recordings was handled by London Records until 1978.” In 1990, Keith Brown took over from Flood as president.

Contacted by Billboard Canada, he offered this tribute to Tarlton: “Working for Donald between 1969 and 2010 I think I can speak for hundreds of co-workers I encountered.

Donald was the head of a family.

For me, his departure was like losing an immediate family member and I believe countless others feel the same way.

We were so lucky have encountered Donald Tarlton.” Also working closely with Aquarius and Tarlton was Toronto music publicist (Bentertainment) and label executive Nanci Malek.

She tells Billboard Canada that “Donald was a titan of the industry.

Working with him for years taught me so much and I was very lucky to have such a mentor.

I think back on that smile that was always present.

He believed in his staff and in his artists and supported us through all the adventures.

Howie Klein, Longtime Reprise President and Free Speech Advocate, Dies at 77 Marc Schneider “He made me his VP of English Canada and he trusted me to launch Francophone artists into English markets, as well as artists such as Sass and the boys of Sum 41, amongst many others.

The career that Donald had cannot be matched and his legacy will be remembered forever.” In 1991,....