[78-L] Reissue 78's...

[Michael Biel]

From: "Steven" <stevenc at interlinks.net>
> Admittedly, Decca DID offer the 80xxx reissue series (based on their
> holdings of Brunswick...?!)...which DID seem to sell very well...?!

Decca itself did many other jazz anthologies on the Decca label itself. 
For example, there were five volumes of Gems of Jazz.  Perhaps you are
not thinking in terms of albums but in individual records.

> However, (RCA) Victor didn't "mine" their vast holdings of important
> recordings [the single album of important Biederbecke recordings
> seems to have been a one-off item?!] for a number of years!

The RCA Victor album series began in 1939, so the concept of reissue
albums in the U.S. was slow in coming, but it was starting on all the
majors by 1940.  These were still in the 1943 Victor catalog:
P-51  Hal Kemp Memorial Album
P-69  8 To The Bar (2 piano Boogie-Woogie)
P-75  Hot Piano
P-80  Getting Sentimental with Tommy Dorsey
P-85  Artie Shaw
P-95  Russ Columbo
P-102 Helen Morgan
P-109  Waller On The Ivories
P-138  Duke Ellington Panoramaa

They started a special album series right at the end of the war.  These
were the first in the Hot Jazz re-issue album series shown in the RCA
Victor ad on the inside front cover of the Dec 1945 Record Changer
HJ-1  Louis Armstrong
HJ-2  Benny Goodman
HJ-3  Lionel Hampton
HJ-4  McCinney's Cotton Pickers
HJ-5  Jelly Roll Morton
HJ-6  Quintet of the Hot Club of France

I don't have Geoffrey Wheeler's books here, but he lists a lot more of
the reissues.  All of these were long before the independent reissue
labels started up in 47 and 48.  

You also accused Columbia of not doing reissues. This is the list of
Columbia jazz reissue albums in the 1940s conveniently from the ad on
the back cover of the Dec 1947 Record Changer -- so these were ALL out
there before the big wave of unauthorized 78 reissues in the late 40s. 
The earliest group of albums started in 1940 as a DIRECT reaction to the
legitimate reissues they had licensed to Commodore, UHJC and HJC in the
1930s.

C-28  Louis Armstrong
C-29  Bix Beiderbecke
C-30  Fletcher Henderson
C-31  Bessie Smith Vol 1 (not the same as the one from 1937)
C-38  Duke Ellington
C-40  Bud Freeman
C-41  Earl Hines
C-43  Frank Teschemacher
C-44  Boogie Woogie
C-46  Hot Trombones
C-51  Dorsey Brothers
C-57  Louis Armstrong Hot Five Vol 1
C-61  Teddy Wilson-Billie Holiday
C-66  Hot Trumpets
C-73  Louis and Earl
C-126  Kid Ory
C-127  Ellington Special
C-130  Boogie Woogie Vol 2
C-135  Billie Holiday Vol 1
C-139  Louis Armstrong Hot Five Vol 2
C-142  Bessie Smith Vol 2
C-144  Bix and Tram

> Interestingly enough, the success of these [Brunswick 80000 series] releases
> may have inspired other releases of "important jazz recordings"...?!  Steven C. Barr

Columbia had about 12 albums out before the Brunswick albums, and Decca
itself already had 5 or 6.  There were also individual reissue singles
by the majors on 78, but these often get buried in the listings among
the current records when looking thru discographies.  The albums stand
out but take a more dedicated effort to get compiled and released.  The
concept of albums per-se was still developing in the 1940s.  The
independents were doing mainly singles and could mix and match among the
defunct companies like Gennett, Paramount, etc. and the majors.  

I might add that in the 1952 Columbia/Armstrong suit against Jolly Roger
it was noted that they realized that their sound recordings were not
copyrighted -- and the out of court settlement continued the puzzle. 
The Columbia suit was based on "invasion of property rights," and
Armstrong based his on an "invasion of privacy" meaning using his name
without permission.  One of the Jolly Roger albums is on French Ebay and
there is a reprint of the Time magazine article right after the suit in
the listing.

http://cgi.ebay.fr/Louis-Armstrong-Sidney-Bechet-Jolly-Roger-5029-VG-/230516390725
 

Does anybody have any Jolly Roger LPs handy?  Looking at the label photo
in the listing, it looks very Columbia-like, not RCA Custom.  It came as
a big surprise that they were RCA Custom pressings when it was exposed
in The Record Changer, yet I would think it should have been obvious. 
Did these pressings have the markings you would expect of an RCA custom
pressing???

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com