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Re: [ARSCLIST] Question: sources for record compannies between 1890-1950
----- Original Message -----
From: "Yue, Joseph" <josephyue@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
I am writing to this list at the suggestion of the music librarian here at
UCLA. I am helping a faculty to locate basic business information (when
company started and dissolved (if), record labels the company managed,
number of employees and amount of camptial) for around 100 record companies
between 1890-1950. The faculty member has a list of company names.
However, after consulting with a few colleagues on campus, I was not still
able to come up with possible sources that would provide this kind of
company history as many of these company are small, private and
short-lived. Any suggestions any of you may have will be highly
appreciated.
And all I can give you is BAD news! Basically, the data you seek is NOT
available in any
convenient form...either via "the Web" or in printed form...! I spent about
twenty (?!)
years compiling pre-1942 data for my "Dating Guide"...and I suspect I STILL
missed
any number of labels...!!
There were a handful of attempts to cash in on the "phonograph boom" in the
"teens"
by pressing and selling vertical-cut discs (which were NOT banned by the
Victor-
Columbia-held patents covering lateral-cut records...!). These increased in
number
until 1919, when the patents expired...and various "indie" labels started
issuing
lateral-cut discs! There is an outside possibility that a page-by-page
search of
relevant journals (i.e. "Talking Machine World," et al...?!) would turn up
MOST
(but not ALL) record companies/labels...but this would still necessitate
further
research as to the "business information" you seek...?!
After 1940, the picture becomes MUCH more complicated! Should one wish
to start a "record label," one could arrange the recording, mastering, and
pressing of one's "next big hit" through companies who provided such
services...!
This means that anyone/everyone who thought there was a market for their
musical (in)competence could make the necessary arrangements to foist it
off on "music lovers" via their own "record label"...!
One simply went down to "Acme Studios"...cut a master of one's "Magnum
Opi" (well, you needed a "B side"...right?!)...took the resulting
tape/acetates
down the road a piece to "Hooflungdung Mastering Works," who would
provide (for a fee, of course...?!) master recordings, which one took
FURTHER down the street to the "International Phonograph Record
Manufactory," who would, for so-much per hundred, stamp you out
as many phonograph records as you requested (and THOUGHT you
could sell...?!).
For example...I have a 78 on the "Okie" label...which was most likely
aimed at homesick "okies" who had moved north to get well-paying
jobs in the steel mills of Gary (IN) and vicinity ! Musically, it is an
amateurish country & western tune. The label cites a Whiting (or
East Chicago), Indiana address; I doubt if more than a hundred
or so phonorecords EVER appeared on this label...and I may well
own the ONLY surviving example of the label...?!
Steven C. Barr