Edouard-Léon Scott de Martinville (1817–1879) invented sound recording twenty years before Thomas Edison re-invented it. But his phonautograph is only one of his many accomplishments. Here, at the bicentennial of his birth, his story is published in depth. This extensively illustrated 48-page softcover book presents new research on Scott and his role as...
Our upcoming release features a whopping 28 selections from 1909, the year Theodore Roosevelt handed the presidential reins to William Howard Taft. 1909: "Talk of Your Scand'lous Times" includes a 24-page full-color booklet with notes and illustrations that bring the year to life.
Before the 20th century, the “sacred” songs of Protestant camp meetings and revivals were as catchy, memorable and personal as the pop songs of that or any other time. Bringing you more recordings from the 1890s than any other historical album to date, Waxing the Gospel is a landmark collection of 102 tracks on three CDs in a 408-page beautifully...
Recordings of arias from long-forgotten Yiddish operas, street-corner ballads, cantorial hymns, and odd traditional folk songs—these lost prizes of Jewish Old World history landed sideways into a 1903 Lambert Company catalog under the description, "Attractive Hebrew Selections." The records are like an ethnographer’s dream, but listen closely and you will...
It took a violin virtuoso leading the band at an upscale New York hotel to turn the world of dance records upside down. Eschewing the cold, impersonal arrangements of military bands, Joseph C. Smith brought a warmth and intimacy to the soundtrack of the 1910s dance craze--always with taste and discipline. He reinvigorated the waltz, helped standardize the...
Anthology: The King of Comic Singers, 1894-1917 features 30 selections, taken from rare cylinders and discs, that highlight Dan W. Quinn's quarter-century in the studio, featuring the up-to-date comic numbers he was best known for, along with sentimental ballads and ragtime songs he helped establish as standards. The 52-page booklet inside the digipak...
25 selections from 1919, the year the White Sox threw the World Series and the nation experienced one of the largest labor strikes in history. Highlights include Marion Harris' "After You've Gone," John Steel's "A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody," Billy Murray's "The Alcoholic Blues" and hits by some of the leading dance orchestras of the day. The set...
26 hits from 1911, the year the nation got wrapped up in the aviation craze and the Triangle fire changed workplace safety laws. Highlights include Gene Greene's "King of the Bungaloos," Blanche Ring's "Come Josephine in My Flying Machine," and Collins and Harlan's "Alexander's Ragtime Band. The set includes a 24-page full-color booklet with an...
Years before writing "It Had to Be You," Isham Jones honed his craft at Mann's Rainbo Gardens in Chicago—composing, arranging, and perfecting songs that he and his band performed nightly before the dinner-and-dance patrons. Jones' style, capturing elements of the social dance craze of the 1910s and anticipating the jazz revolution of the 1920s, offers a...
A humorist who spent 22 years waxing his Uncle Josh stories, Cal Stewart was the first performer whose stage appearances were celebrated by reference to his records rather than the other way around. In his famous role as "rube" Uncle Josh Weathersby, he entertained millions of listeners with tales of his antics both in New York City and at home in Punkin...
1918: "Like the Sunshine After Rain" features 24 selections from the year World War I came to a close and an influenza epidemic swept the nation. Selections include wartime and comic songs, songs that would become part of the Great American Songbook, and early jazz and dance numbers by Joseph C. Smith's Orchestra and the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. The...
Bohemian-born Bohumir Kryl made sounds with the cornet that audiences had never heard before and that no one had dared to try to record until he came along. He had the outsized ego to make sure he would not soon be forgotten, making his interpretations of the classic repertoire into standards along the way. World-Famous Wizard of the Cornet features 28...
1917: "Yankees to the Ranks" presents 25 songs from the year the U.S. declared war on Germany and entered into World War I. The 24-page color booklet includes extensive notes on all the songs and an interpretive historical essay that tells the story of patriotic volunteerism. Old favorite artists such as Billy Murray, Campbell and Burr, and Collins and...
The Complete Wolverines: 1924-1928 reissues for the first time all of the sides made by The Wolverine Orchestra: the groundbreaking records with Bix, the two often-missing Jimmy McPartland sides, and the electrically-recorded sides by the Original Wolverines, featuring McPartland and two other Wolverine alumni. The set features 27 selections and includes...
The Sound of Vaudeville, Vol. 2 covers the career of Eddie Morton from 1911 through 1917. He was one of the variety stage's most important song pluggers of the era: if Eddie featured it, it would be a hit. All-time classics include "The Oceana Roll" and "Play That Barbershop Chord." Don't miss Morton's own compositions, "Noodle Soup Rag" and "I've Got...
"Pennant-Winning Battery of Songland" compiles the first recordings made by Jazz Age superstars Gus Van and Joe Schenck. The collection features 28 selections recorded between 1916 and 1918 and includes a 28-page color booklet with biographical notes by vaudevillian and author Trav S.D. that trace their rise from boyhood friends performing in Brooklyn to...
The High Priestess of Jollity & The Southern Singer brings together the complete recorded output of two early stars of the vaudeville stage: Clarice Vance and May Irwin. Though prominent on stage—and sheet music covers—both had very short recording careers, with Irwin's output totalling 6 sides and Vance's 15. This set presents these 21 recordings for...
1914: "Her Memory Haunts You" features 25 selections from the year that the hopes and dreams of the progressive coalition that had put their faith in the presidency of Woodrow Wilson saw their agenda put on hold while economic issues--and then the beginning of World War I--took center stage. The soundtrack to the year brings us a good mix of future...