Columbia Records - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
For the Columbia Records label in Japan, see . Columbia was originally the local company distributing and selling and in , and , and derives its name from the , which was its headquarters. As was the custom of some of the regional phonograph companies, Columbia produced many commercial cylinder recordings of its own, and its catalogue of musical records in 1891 was 10 pages long.
Columbia severed its ties to Edison and the in , and thereafter sold only records and phonographs of its own manufacture.
Columbia began selling and phonographs in addition to the cylinder system in . For a decade, Columbia competed with both the cylinders and the disc records as one of the top three names in recorded sound.
In Columbia introduced mass production of "Double Sided" disc records, with recordings stamped into both sides of the disc.
During this early period, Columbia used the famous "Magic Notes" logo--a pair of in a circle--both in the United States and overseas (where this logo would never substantially change).
In July , Columbia decided to concentrate exclusively on disc records and stopped recording new cylinder records and manufacturing cylinder phonographs although they continued pressing and selling cylinder records from their back catalogue for a year or two more.
Label of a Columbia disc from . This striking "banner" design was one of the first multicolor label designs and remains popular with record collectors.
On February 25, 1925, Columbia began recording with the new electric recording process licensed from .
The new "Viva-tonal" records set a benchmark in tone and clarity unequalled during the 78 era. The first electrical recordings were made by , the popular "Whispering Pianist." In a secret agreement with Victor, both companies did not make the new recording technology public knowledge for some months, in order not to hurt sales of their existing acoustically recorded catalogue while a new electrically recorded catalogue was being built.
In , Columbia acquired and its growing stable of jazz and blues artists including . In 1928, , the nation's most popular orchestra leader, left Victor to record for Columbia. That same year, Columbia executive Frank Buckley Walker pioneered some of the first country music or "hillbilly" genre recordings in including artists such as Clarence Green and the legendary fiddler and entertainer, Charlie Bowman.
1929 saw industry legend signing on as house bandleader and A. R. director.
Other favorites in the Viva-tonal era included , and . Columbia kept using acoustic recording for "budget label" pop product well into 1929 on the Harmony and Velvet Tone labels.
In 1931, the English merged with the to form Electric Musical Industries Ltd.
( ). EMI was forced to sell its American Columbia operations because of anti-trust concerns to the , makers of the . But Majestic soon fell on hard times.
A notable marketing ploy was the Columbia "Royal Blue Record," a brilliant blue laminated product with matching label. Made from 1932-'35, the Royal Blue issues are particularly popular with collectors for their rarity and musical interest. An abortive gimmick was the "Longer Playing Record," a finer-grooved 10" 78 with 4:30 to 5:00 playing time per side.
But nothing slowed Columbia's decline in a day when the phonograph itself had become a passé luxury. In 1934, Grigsby-Grunow went under and was forced to sell Columbia for a mere $75,000 to the (ARC). This combine already included as its premium label, and Columbia was relegated to slower sellers such as the Hawaiian music of and the still unknown .
By late 1936, pop releases were discontinued, leaving the label essentially defunct.
In ARC, including the Columbia label in the USA, was bought by of the for US$700,000. (CBS had originally been co-founded by Columbia Records, who soon cashed out leaving only the name.
) CBS revived the Columbia label in place of Brunswick and the Okeh label in place of . The Columbia trademark from this point until the late 1950s was two overlapping circles with the Magic Notes in the left circle and a CBS microphone in the right circle. The Royal Blue labels now disappeared in favor of a deep red, which caused to claim infringement on its "Red Seal" trademark.
(RCA lost the case.) The blue Columbia label was kept for its line which was later changed to green label before switching to a gray label in the late 1950s, then to the bronze that is familiar to owners of its classical and Broadway albums.
At this time, Columbia's president, , instrumental in steering Paley to the ARC purchase, set his talents to the goal (as he saw it) of hearing an entire movement of a symphony on one side of an album.
Ward Botsford writing for the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Issue of "High Fidelity Magazine", relates, "He was no inventor—he was simply a man who seized an idea whose time was ripe and begged, ordered, and cajoled a thousand men into bringing into being the now accepted medium of the record business."
Resulting from Wallerstein's brief and stormy tenure, in Columbia introduced the Long Playing microgroove ( ) record (sometimes in early advertisements Lp) format, which rotated at 33? , which became the standard for the gramophone record for half a century.
CBS research director Dr. played a managerial role in the collaborative effort, but Wallerstein credits engineer with the technical prowess that brought the long-playing disc to the public.
Columbia's LPs were particularly well-suited to classical music's long pieces, so some of the early albums featured such artists as and the , and the , and and the .
The success of these recordings eventually persuaded RCA Victor to begin releasing LPs in 1950, quickly followed by other major American labels.
In 1951, Columbia USA severed its decades-long distribution arrangement with EMI and signed a distribution deal with to market Columbia recordings outside North America. EMI continued to distribute Okeh and later Epic label recordings for several years into the 1960s.
Columbia became the most successful record company in the 1950s when they hired impresario away from the Mercury label. Miller quickly signed on Mercury's biggest artist at the time, , and discovered several of the decade's biggest recording stars including , , , , and . In , CBS formed Columbia's sister label .
In 1955, Columbia USA decisively broke with its past when it replaced the microphone/"Magic Notes" logo with a new, -style "Walking Eye" logo. This logo actually depicts a stylus (the legs) on a record (the eye); however, the "eye" also subtly refers to CBS's main business in , and that division's iconic Eye logo. The original Walking Eye was tall and solid; it was modified in 1960 to the familiar one still used today (pictured on this page).
Columbia began recording in stereo in early 1957. As with RCA Victor, most of the early stereo recordings were of classical artists, including the New York Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by , , and , and the Philadelphia Orchestra conducted by . Some sessions were made with the Columbia Symphony Orchestra, an ensemble drawn from leading New York musicians, which had first made recordings with Sir Thomas Beecham in 1949 in Columbia's famous New York City studios.
and the recorded mostly for Epic. When Epic dropped classical music, the roster and catalogue was moved to .
In 1961, CBS ended its arrangement with Philips Records and formed its own international organization, CBS Records, which released Columbia recordings outside the USA and Canada on the CBS label.
When Epic's distribution deal with EMI expired, CBS Records distributed Epic recordings on the Epic label outside North America as well. Epic distributed between 1967-1969 and between 1976-1979
In 1962, Columbia joined in the then red hot genre by releasing debut albums by the and, more significantly, .
In September 1964, CBS established its own British distribution by purchasing its British distributor, the independent label, pressing plant and recording studio (as well as its sold-only-in-Woolworth's Embassy cover version label).
In 1966, another Columbia subsidiary label, Date, was created mainly for the soul music outlet. This label released the first string of hits for . Date's biggest success was Time Of The Season by , peaking at #2 in 1969.
The label was discontinued in 1971.
The Columbia label became more of a label following the appointment of as president in , but still had a hand in traditional pop and jazz. One of its key acquisitions during this period was .
She released her first solo album on Columbia in 1963 and remains with the label to this day.
The structure of US Columbia remained the same until 1980, when it spun off the classical/Broadway unit into a separate imprint, (now Sony Classical).
In the early 1970s, Columbia began recording in a four-channel process called , using the "SQ" standard which used an electronic encoding process that could be decoded by special amplifiers and then played through four speakers, with each speaker placed in the corner of a room.
Remarkably, RCA Victor countered with another quadraphonic process which required a special cartridge to play the "discrete" recordings for four-channel playback. Both Columbia and RCA's quadraphonic records could be played on conventional stereo equipment. Although the Columbia process required less equipment and was quite effective, many were confused by the competing systems and sales of both Columbia's matrix recordings and RCA's discrete recordings were disappointing.
A few other companies also issued some matrix recordings for a few years. Quadraphonic recording was used by both classical artists, including Leonard Bernstein and Pierre Boulez, and popular artists such as Barbra Streisand and Carlos Santana.
In 1982, CBS Records (through Epic) manufactured 's , the biggest-selling album ever.
In CBS Records, including the Columbia Records unit, was acquired by , who re-christened the parent division in 1991. As Sony only had a temporary license on the CBS Records name, it then acquired the rights to the Columbia trademarks outside the U.S.
, Canada and Japan (Columbia Graphophone) from , which generally had not been used by them since the early 1970s. was renamed . In December 2006, revived the name for a new minor label closely linked with its television properties.
In , Columbia made an affiliation with unsigned artist promotion label to distribute Aware's artists music. Through this venture, Columbia has had success finding highly successful artists. In , Columbia and Aware accepted the option to continue this relationship.
Sony merged its music division with Bertelsmann AG's BMG unit in 2004; the combined company, , continues to use the Columbia Records name and Walking Eye logo in all markets except Japan (where that division is called Sony Records and is still fully owned by Sony). In Japan, the Columbia trademarks (including a modified Magic Notes logo) is still held by the former Nippon Columbia, now called . Sony Music uses a modified version of the Magic Notes trademark for the logo of its label.
Beginning in the 1990s, Columbia occasionally brought back the "notes and mike" logo but without the CBS mark on the microphone. That logo is currently used in the "Columbia Jazz" series of jazz releases and reissues.
Currently, Sony BMG's catalog division, reissues classic albums for Columbia.
Revolution in Sound: A Biography of the Recording Industry. Little, Brown and Company, 1974. . High Fidelity Magazine, ABC, Inc. April, 1976, "Creating the LP Record." The Columbia Master Book Discography, compiled by Brian Rust. Greenwood Press, 1999.
Keywords: Magic Notes, Columbia Records, Cbs Records, Royal Blue, Walking Eye, New York, Rca Victor, High Fidelity, Classical Music, North America
News RSS