[78-L] Record Stores

[Geoffrey Wheeler]

These "pirate" re-issues generated a lot of controversy in the forties!
Technically, of course, they were illegal in virtually all the states 
(this
was only partially dealt with in more recent copyright laws covering
sound recordings) I had, and THINK I still have, a complete set of
Record Changer magazines...and there wasa LOT of discussion about
such issues (and the dearth of legal reissues of great jazz performances
as well...!). The eventual result was that the record companies finally
realized they were "sitting on a gold mine" and started reissuing jazz
rarities...often in album-set form...!

Commodore Music Shop, HRS, and UHCA were legitimate and licensed their 
reissues from original ARC, Columbia Phonograph, and OKeh recordings. 
Gennett reissues were probably licensed from Decca. Columbia 
Phonograph’s Bridgeport plant did the pressing. The Jazz Information 
reissue label created by the Editor of Jazz Information magazine drew 
on recordings issued by dead labels and probably made no effort to 
license any of the material. Since the recordings were made available 
only to Jazz Information subscribers, the press runs were probably 
pretty small. These are represented by JI 1-10. JI11-16 are all 
original recordings by Bunk Johnson.  These are relatively easy to find 
but JI 1-10 are not. These were later reissued on higher-number UHCA 
issues. Unlike the other three reissue labels, all of JI’s number 1-10 
reissues were dubs provided by collectors. This was also true for 
reissues issued in the Signature 900 series and the Session 1-8 series.

No reissues used by the legitimate reissue labels came from Victor. At 
the time Commodore Music Shop began reissues on its own “house” label, 
Victor was using its new Bluebird budget label as a combination reissue 
and recording label. Victor management would have had no interest in 
licensing any of its product to outside reissuers. By using their own 
distribution system, their pressing runs would be larger, they would 
sell more records, and make more money—all compelling reasons not to 
license any third-party companies. By not using Victor, Commodore Music 
Shop, UHCA, and HRS got laminated pressings that in some cases were 
better than the original issues, especially those on ARC labels that 
were pressed at the Scranton plant, not the Columbia Phonograph plant.. 
Even early Commodore pressings are laminated. You can tell by the 
pressings, and the labels are darker than later issues. CBS-Columbia 
was launched in August 1939. By October, HRS and UHCA had been informed 
that Columbia would no longer press records for them. HRS had planned 
to issue an album of recordings by Clarence Williams’ Blue Five with 
Bechet and Armstrong (HRS 27 through 31). Only HRS 31, which was drawn 
from the Gennett label, was issued; the rest of the reissues, which 
were owned by CBS-Columbia, were cancelled. Since CBS held the HRS 
reissue masters, these were destroyed. Some of this was discussed in an 
  exchange of letters between Steve Smith and John Hammond that were 
published in the HRS Society Rag. Another reason for cutting the small 
companies out of the reissue business was the major labels could do a 
far better job marketing reissues, which proved to be the case.

The unlicensed bootleg reissues from 1947-1952 were done by totally 
different people and though technically illegal, provided a valuable 
service to collectors, historians, discographers, and researchers. All 
told there were 43 American bootleg 78 labels that  collectively 
released more than 1400 sides. Some of these same people then got into 
bootleg LP reissues, but that’s another story.