The former manager of The Rolling Stones and The Beatles Allen Klein, who played a major role in the break-up of the Beatles and also gained control of some of the Rolling Stones best-known songs, died in New York on July 4 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease. He was 77.

The New Jersey born Klein practised as an accountant before making a move into music management, taking control of Sam Cooke’s career in the sixties and managing to free up royalty payments owed to Cooke by his record company.

He formed the ABKCO company, named after himself and his wife, in the mid- sixties as a vehicle to control songs and recordings. In 1965 Mick Jagger enlisted Klein’s help to renegotiate the Stones recording contract with Decca. He managed to secure them a huge advance and ended up managing the group for about five years at a 20 per cent fee. The Stones eventually tired of Klein, but the only way to break free of him was to give up the rights to their master recordings; rights to such timeless tunes as "Satisfaction" and "Jumpin Jack Flash"

His aggressive skills came to the attention of a number of other bands, including The Beatles. Klein scored a rich recording deal for the Beatles, however, his relationship with the Fab Four created a schism in the group, Paul McCartney being the most adamantly opposed to him, and he parted ways with their Apple operation in the early seventies. Amid a series of complex manoeuvrings that have consequences to this very day, Klein unsuccessfully tried to secure control of the Beatles copyrights on behalf of the group. Michael Jackson ended up with the rights 16 years later.

His company’s assets (ABKCO Music & Records) include recordings by the Rolling Stones, the Animals, Herman's Hermits, Bobby Womack, the Kinks, Chubby Checker, Bobby Rydell, Ray Davies, Pete Townshend and many others.