Prestige Records

Not to be confused with the namesake Prestige Records, a UK label that releases the work of Imran Khan.

Prestige Records
Parent company	Concord Music Group
Founded	1949
Founder	Bob Weinstock
Genre	Jazz
Country of origin	United States
Location	New York City
Official Website	concordmusicgroup.com/labels/Prestige/

Prestige Records was a jazz record label founded in 1949 by Bob Weinstock. The company was located at 203 South Washington Avenue in Bergenfield, New Jersey,^[1] and recorded hundreds of albums by many of the leading jazz musicians of the day, sometimes issuing them under the names of several subsidiaries. The company was sold to Fantasy in 1971, which was later absorbed by Concord.

History

Weinstock opened a record store for collectors in 1948 while still a teenager. The store was next door to the Metropole Jazz Club in New York City. Jazz musicians would hang out and rehearse at the Club, and then migrate upstairs next door to Weinstock's store. Weinstock got the idea to record these jazz stars by offering them cash payments.

Prestige office was located at 446 West 50th Street, New York City.^[2] The label's name was initially New Jazz, but changed to Prestige Records the next year. Its catalog contains a significant number of jazz classics, including renowned works by Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, Thelonious Monk and many others. Weinstock was known for encouraging the performances to be unrehearsed for a more authentic, exciting sound. To this effect, Prestige Records, unlike Blue Note Records, would not pay musicians for rehearsals. Another Weinstock practice, of rewinding the tapes after "bad" takes, has resulted in very few alternate takes from the classic Prestige years surfacing.

For most of the 1950s and 1960s, the recording engineer Rudy Van Gelder was responsible for recording the company's releases and Ira Gitler occasionally fulfilled the role of producer in the early 1950s. Around 1958, Prestige began to diversify, reviving the "New Jazz" name, usually for recordings by emerging musicians, and introduced the Swingsville and Moodsville lines, though these were relatively short-lived, many albums being re-released later in the 1960s on Prestige itself. Bluesville Records was also a subsidiary label of Prestige.

During this period, Weinstock ceased supervising recording sessions directly, employing Chris Albertson, Ozzie Cadena, Esmond Edwards, Don Schlitten, and producer/music supervisor Bob Porter, among others, to fulfil this function. Musicians recording for the label at this time included Jaki Byard and Booker Ervin, while Prestige remained commercially viable by recording a number of soul jazz artists like Charles Earland.

Bob Weinstock has been criticized over the years for allegedly sharp business practices. Jackie McLean in A.B. Spellman's Four Lives in the Bebop Business (1966) is particularly outspoken, but others, including Albertson and Miles Davis in his autobiography, have defended him. The company was sold ^[3] to Fantasy Records in 1971, and original releases on the label formed a significant proportion of their Original Jazz Classics line. Fantasy was purchased by Concord Records in 2005.^[3]

Discography

Main article: Prestige Records discography

References

1. ^ Original 1965 liner notes to Blue Seven
2. ^ Van Gelder Studio by Ira Gitler
3. ^ ^{a b} "The Prestige Legacy". http://www.jazzitude.com/prestige_profiles_home.htm. Retrieved 21 March 2010. 

External links

• Official website
• Prestige discography