On 12/08/13 3:16 PM, Sean Smith wrote:
In other words it's hard to build up trust and the label created an easy proxy for it.
Back in the '50s the recording industry was dominated by three companies (Victor, Columbia, and Decca in the US), and they basically dictated what people heard:99% mainsteream classical music.
The advent of the tape recorder allowed small labels and individuals to produce their own records, and many turned to early music to find repertoire not available from the big three. We've all talked about how influential Julian Bream's early lute records were, especially his Victor Elizabethan lute record. In going back through my music library (thousands of vinyls, and even a few acoustical 78s!) I realized that I'd totally forgotten that Bream had an extensive recording career _before_ that epochal disk, on one of those small independent labels, Westminster. He made at least 4 LPs for Westminster, mostly on the guitar, but there was one of Dowland's lute music, played on the lute. Believe me, in those days there was a miniscule market for guitar music played by anyone other than Segovia, and ZERO market for Dowland lute solos. Westminster took a gamble on young Bream, and did quite well by him, but it wasn't until he jumped ship to Victor that his recording career really took off.
Geoff -- Geoff Gaherty Foxmead Observatory Coldwater, Ontario, Canada http://www.gaherty.ca http://starrynightskyevents.blogspot.com/ To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
