[78-L] acoustic vanity - price list?

[Malcolm Rockwell]

Yeahbut... 4 sides were cut in Richmond on Feb. 18, 1924 and the two 
acceptable ones "Fidgety Feet" b/w "Jazz Me Blues" were released on 
Gennett 5408, so it wasn't a vanity pressing... unless, of course, it 
was decided by Gennett to release after the fact. The other two sides 
"Lazy Daddy" (3 takes) and "Sensation" (2 takes) were not issued but it 
is possible they got test copies of those, too. Far as I know no tests 
of the two non-issues have surfaced and no recording cards are known to 
have survived.
Mal

*******

On 1/27/2011 11:08 AM, david.diehl at hensteeth.com wrote:
> IIRC, one of the members of the Wolverines recalled their first Gennet session in Feb., 1924 cost each of the 8 band members $25, so 200 bucks for four sides, and 25 copies of the two acceptable performances coupled together. And the photograph ;-)
>   DJD
> Visit the Blue Pages: the Encyclopedic Guide to 78 RPM Party Records
> http://www.hensteeth.com
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Rodger Holtin [mailto:rjh334578 at yahoo.com]
> Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2011 01:02 PM
> To: '78-L Mail List'
> Subject: Re: [78-L] acoustic vanity - price list?
>
> These examples are interesting, but not quite the same as making a short-run of a vanity record. The examples cited are records for which the pressing plant had metal parts shipped in to them for pressing in their geographic area, so the expense of a recording session, wax, plating, etc was probably not part of their in-house expense, whereas the true vanity record would have incurred all those expenses on top of the price of actual pressing. SURELY, somebody has found a price list for this kind of stuff. I would bet there are copies in Rudy Vallee's stuff as he made a number of private-vanity records and he seems to have kept everything he ever touched in his lifetime.RodgerFor Best Results use Victor Needles..--- On Wed, 1/26/11, Benno Häupl  wrote:From: Benno Häupl Subject: Re: [78-L] acoustic vanityTo: 78-l at 78online.comDate: Wednesday, January 26, 2011, 11:56 PMAre you sure that it would have been that expensive to have small run made? Hugo Strötbaum (www.recordingpioneers.com) found correspondence in Hayes between HMV head office and their agent in Cairo. IIRC, the letter was dated around 1908. HMV at Hayes threatened Cairo to cancel the contract with their Egyptian representative. They were not prepared anymore to press less than 15 copies of any given record. In other words, before that time there were runs of less than 15 copies. Which explains why only about 10% (!) of the discs in the Egyptian HMV catalog have surfaced so far! Another example. Richard Weize of Bear Family Records interviewed the product manager of the German M-G-M label at Electrola in Cologne. This man confirmed following fact. The three German issues of Hank Williams 78s were initially pressed in 5 (five!) copies, and when sold, another five were re-pressed, and finally a last batch of five. All three German Hank Williams M-G-M's had a run of 15 copies total! So, couldn't a person have 15 copies pressed of a vanity record? Benno