Big Jazz on SmallsLIVE
Since its launch in 2010, the SmallsLIVE record label has been offering a substantial sampling of the outstanding jazz talent consistently featured at Smalls Jazz Club in New York City's Greenwich Village. Musicians who appear on the label range from the great veterans Harold Mabern and Jimmy Cobb to contemporary players at the top of their ...
Read MoreHalf Note Records: Live from the Blue Note
Jeff Levenson has been at the helm of Half Note Records since 2002, just a few years after it got off the ground. Through a combination of his leadership and vision and the great artistry of the musicians represented in its catalog--including McCoy Tyner, Elvin Jones, Lee Konitz and many others--the label has clearly made its ...
Read MoreDiatribe Recordings: Heart and Soul of the Music
Whilst Ireland has long produced music of world renown, this tiny, most Westerly European nation has never been quite so famous for producing cutting edge jazz. However, as European jazz has gradually let slip the American accent--an evolution that perhaps gathered its greatest momentum with the birth of the ECM label--so, too, in Ireland, a new ...
Read MoreOzella Music: Nordic Beauty and Beyond
It is always tempting to explain one story in the light of another, and in the case of guitarist and composer Dagobert Böhm's Ozella Music label, it is inevitable to be reminded of Windham Hill, the record company started by the guitarist William Ackerman in 1976. Like Windham Hill, Ozella started out as one-man project run ...
Read MoreCuneiform Records: Growing Progressive Music for 27 Years
Twenty seven years is a long time for a niche progressive music label such as Cuneiform Records not just to survive, but to remain inventive and, in the best sense, ambitious. Steve Feigenbaum founded Cuneiform back in 1984, and with his wife, Joyce, runs it from Silver Springs, Maryland. Hosting bands such as Universe Zero, digging ...
Read MoreMusic Matters: The Blue Note Reissue Series
Music Matters has been reissuing classic Blue Note jazz records since 2007. It has dug deep into the catalog, remastering lesser known, infrequently heard titles, and done so with passionate attention to presenting the highest possible sound quality. Offering an analog solution in a digital age, this exceptional series is available on 45rpm vinyl records only. ...
Read MoreAccurate Records: Growing Out of Boston
In the age of globalization, when almost every musician churns out his or her own record digitally, the boundary between being a one-man business and a record company is porous. However, while many of the new labels remain dedicated to a small circle of artists, there is also the more rarified example of the musician-based label ...
Read MoreStoryville Records: A Treasure Trove of Swinging Jazz
Since its foundation during the European revivalist movement of the early 1950s, Copenhagen-based Storyville Records has grown into a major repository of New Orleans, big band and mainstream recordings. With something approaching 600 releases in its back catalogue, the label is a treasure trove of jazz that swings.
Founded in 1952 by Danish jazz fan Karl ...
Read MoreRune Grammofon: Mutation and Reevaluation
Since its inception in 1998, Rune Grammofon has been at the forefront of ground breaking new music, heralding a new unprecedented interest in Scandinavian music. Whereas ECM's focus on the region has largely been based around the folk/traditional music explorations of its most prolific artists, including Jan Garbarek, Arild Andersen, Terje Rypdal and Jon Christensen, and ...
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