"The music business needed men like Ken".

Ken East, a mover and shaker at the birth of modern music, has died at his home in Australia aged 83.

An EMI executive during The Beatles' Sixties heyday, East also had the dubious honour of overseeing Decca's darkest days before rejoining EMI to play his part in the advent of post-punk and the new romantic movement.

East was born on May 27 1924 in Sydney and served in the Second World War as radar technician with the Royal Australian Air Force seeing action in New Guinea. After the war, East moved into the import/export business in his home town, handling engineering and automotive products before moving into vinyl sales.

In his late twenties and now with a bug for music, East joined EMI's Australian outpost as a salesman, rising to record sales manager in 1956.

He eventually rose to head the Record Division and, in May 1963, moved to London to take the job of commercial manager of EMI's Overseas Division.

As England got its first taste of The Beatles, East quickly moved up the ranks, becoming managing director of EMI Records - or Gramophone Company Limited, as it was then known.

He soon found himself at the centre of one of the Fab Four's controversial episodes when - in a forerunner of the digital leaks common today - Radio London got its hands on an advance copy of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.