[78-L] King Cole [was Walter Winchell]

[david.diehl at hensteeth.com]

The Rene brothers were New Orleans creoles who moved to California. Exclusive was their primary label, originally used to exploit their own compositions in the late 1930's. Ammor was a side bet which probably included other investors. There is an ad in Variety from mid-1940 which shows a New York address and all issues through 109 IIRC. That seems to be the end of the Ammor story.
AMO matrices are C.P.MacGregor recordings. This AM/AMO mx. series dates back to the mid-1930's, Ammor was just one of many transient clients and the similarity of the letter prefix to the label name is purely coincidental.
 DJD
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-----Original Message-----
From: Han Enderman [mailto:jcenderman at solcon.nl]
Sent: Thursday, November 25, 2010 05:48 PM
To: '78-L'
Subject: [78-L] King Cole [was Walter Winchell]

Ammor, replaced by Excelsior & Exclusive, were labels of Californian (black) brothers Leon & Otis Rene. A later label is Class.Look at the many Leon Rene compostions on these labels.The small & rare Ammor label was the first (& is listed by Ty).I assume that AMO prefixes are from the time this label existed.The Coles on Ammor are credited to King Cole, and not to the Trio.Excelsior 102-103 (coupled) - recd in Oct 1942 - is on Cap 139.Then Ammor did not record anymore, though some issues may have been still available.Han Enderman===>>> On 11/24/2010 8:54 PM, Steven wrote:> From: David Lennick>> Savoy also had two early King Cole sides which it acquired from Varsity>> which> acquired them from Ammor.>>> The provenance of those KC3 sides is hopelessly complicated...! Cole, living> on the west coast, seems to have cut them for the little-known (and> failing?!)> Ammor label (Californian!).When Cole's Decca sides became "hits," any> number of labels reissued his pre-WWII sides (including a number of> transcription sides?!).True, although the one transcription company involved was D&S and they seem to have issued their recordings commercially as 78s and simultaneously to radio stations as transcriptions. I've seen other examples from them.>> This was the VERY tail end of an era when labels signed artists to> "exclusive"> contracts whenever possible. Many well-known artists chose to continue as> independents...earning a fixed (and often low!) sum per issued recording!>In Cole's case, he was signed to Capitol during the ban and the label was so anxious to get something out by the Trio, they bought a couple of masters that had been recorded for Excelsior in 1942. Some of Cole's Excelsior sides have AMO matrix numbers, so Ammor may still have been on the scene in 1943..or not..dl<<<_______________________________________________78-L mailing list78-L at klickitat.78online.comhttp://klickitat.78online.com/mailman/listinfo/78-l