Delmark Records
Encyclopedia
Delmark Records is an independent American jazz
and blues
record label, based in Chicago
since 1958. The label originated in St. Louis, Missouri
, in 1953 when owner Bob Koester
released a recording of the Windy City Six, a traditional jazz group, under the "Delmar" imprint.
, Kansas, to a family of German descent, Bob Koester
began collecting records in high school. Initially a jazz fan, Koester also developed a taste for the blues from the intricate relationship these musics shared in the 1940s and 50s.
Moving from Wichita to St Louis, Missouri, to attend college, Koester began his career as a record trader in his dormitory room. Joining a local Jazz Club gave Koester his first taste of live jazz - seeing Bob Graf and Clark Terry
perform. Soon enough he had made acquaintance with a fellow Jazz Club member Ron Fister with who Koester would open his first record shop - K & F Sales. Shortly after opening in an old restaurant storefront they changed the name to the Blue Note Record Shop.
About a year after this joint venture Fister and Koester decided to part ways, with Koester moving to a new location on the corner of Delmar and Oliver streets in St Louis. Taking the name from the street his shop was on Koester (then only 21 years old) recorded a local jazz group the Windy City Six in 1953. Shortly thereafter Koester searched out and found local talent in bluesmen such as Speckled Red
, James Crutchfield
, Big Joe Williams
and J.D. Short
.
After a period in St Louis Koester decided to move to Chicago
and in August of 1958 uprooted his little shop and headed north. Initially trying out a space on Wabsah Ave Koester soon bought out longtime record store Seymour's Jazz Mart. Renaming the storefront the Jazz Record Mart Delmark Records found its new home in the basement of the record shop.
By 1963 Koester had moved the shop to a location at 7 West Grand. During this period in Chicago Delmark would release historic albums by both Blues and Jazz artists then on the Chicago scene. Releasing albums by traditional jazz artists like George Lewis
, the Dixie Stompers, Albert Nichols and Barney Bigard
alongside bop
and post bop artists like Jimmy Forrest
, Bud Powell
, Donald Byrd
and Ira Sullivan
.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s Delmark would record groundbreaking blues artists, particularly documenting the "West Side" electric blues sound found in Chicago. Artists like Junior Wells
, Buddy Guy
, J. B. Hutto, Robert Nighthawk, Luther Allison
, Magic Sam
, Jimmy Dawkins
and dozens more would record for Delmark. In addition to the electric blues sound, Delmark would also release records by the folk country blues artists being brought up from the south. Big Joe Williams
, Sleepy John Estes
, Arthur Crudup
, Yank Rachell
and the blues piano of Roosevelt Sykes
would establish Delmark's far reaching historic documentation.
In 1966 Chuck Nessa, then manager of the Jazz Record Mart, convinced Koester to release albums by musicians associated with the AACM
. The first record was Roscoe Mitchell
’s Sound
(1966) which received a five star review in Downbeat, and is considered a ground breaking and historical piece of avant-garde jazz
. This was followed by a string of releases on Delmark that highlighted the new music being played in Chicago by artists associated with the AACM including Muhal Richard Abrams
' Levels and Degrees of Light
(1968), Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre
's Humility in the Light of the Creator (1969) and Anthony Braxton
's For Alto
(1969) (the first solo sax record ever recorded). Additionally Delmark released two of the earliest Sun Ra
albums, Sun Song and Sound of Joy
, in 1967 and 1968 respectively.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s Delmark continued to release both ground breaking and historically important jazz and blues albums. Records by Sonny Stitt
, the Art Ensemble Of Chicago
, Malachi Thompson
and Coleman Hawkins
coming out at the same time as distinguished blues artists like Jimmy Johnson
, Otis Rush
, and Little Walter
. Through the 1980s and 1990s Delmark continued to release an array of Chicago based jazz and blues. From trad and bop to avant-garde jazz, and from country folk to electric and jump blues, Delmark's catalog covers over 350 albums and spans the recorded history of jazz and blues making it a seminal label in 20th century American music.
Today Delmark is still a thriving force on the Chicago creative music scene. Releasing records by jazz artists Rob Mazurek
, Nicole Mitchell
, Ken Vandermark
, Fred Anderson
, Josh Berman, Keefe Jackson, Roy Campbell, Jr.
, Jeff Parker, Ethnic Heritage Ensemble
; blues artists such as Shirley Johnson, Zora Young
, Ken Saydak
, Little Arthur Duncan, Byther Smith
, Jimmy Burns
; ragtime
artists such as Terry Waldo, and many more.
In March 2010 Delmark announced the release of the album Revisit by the Polish duo Mikrokolektyw. This album marks the first release of a European avant jazz group on Delmark in its 57-year history.
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
and blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
record label, based in Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
since 1958. The label originated in St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis is an independent city on the eastern border of Missouri, United States. With a population of 319,294, it was the 58th-largest U.S. city at the 2010 U.S. Census. The Greater St...
, in 1953 when owner Bob Koester
Bob Koester
Robert Gregg "Bob" Koester is the American founder and owner of Delmark Records, one of the oldest independent record labels in the United States, and one of jazz's best-known imprints...
released a recording of the Windy City Six, a traditional jazz group, under the "Delmar" imprint.
History
Born in 1932 in WichitaWichita, Kansas
Wichita is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kansas.As of the 2010 census, the city population was 382,368. Located in south-central Kansas on the Arkansas River, Wichita is the county seat of Sedgwick County and the principal city of the Wichita metropolitan area...
, Kansas, to a family of German descent, Bob Koester
Bob Koester
Robert Gregg "Bob" Koester is the American founder and owner of Delmark Records, one of the oldest independent record labels in the United States, and one of jazz's best-known imprints...
began collecting records in high school. Initially a jazz fan, Koester also developed a taste for the blues from the intricate relationship these musics shared in the 1940s and 50s.
Moving from Wichita to St Louis, Missouri, to attend college, Koester began his career as a record trader in his dormitory room. Joining a local Jazz Club gave Koester his first taste of live jazz - seeing Bob Graf and Clark Terry
Clark Terry
Clark Terry is an American swing and bop trumpeter, a pioneer of the fluegelhorn in jazz, educator, NEA Jazz Masters inductee, and recipient of the 2010 Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award...
perform. Soon enough he had made acquaintance with a fellow Jazz Club member Ron Fister with who Koester would open his first record shop - K & F Sales. Shortly after opening in an old restaurant storefront they changed the name to the Blue Note Record Shop.
About a year after this joint venture Fister and Koester decided to part ways, with Koester moving to a new location on the corner of Delmar and Oliver streets in St Louis. Taking the name from the street his shop was on Koester (then only 21 years old) recorded a local jazz group the Windy City Six in 1953. Shortly thereafter Koester searched out and found local talent in bluesmen such as Speckled Red
Speckled Red
Speckled Red was born Rufus Perryman in Monroe, Louisiana. He was an American blues and boogie-woogie piano player and singer, most noted for his recordings of "The Dirty Dozens", with exchanges of insults and vulgar remarks that have long been a part of African American folklore.The family moved...
, James Crutchfield
James Crutchfield
James Crutchfield was an American St. Louis, Missouri based, barrelhouse blues singer, pianist, and songwriter, whose career spanned seven decades...
, Big Joe Williams
Big Joe Williams
Joseph Lee Williams , billed throughout his career as Big Joe Williams, was an American Delta blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, notable for the distinctive sound of his nine-string guitar...
and J.D. Short
J.D. Short
J.D. Short was an American Delta blues singer, guitarist and harmonicist. He was a multi-instrumentalist, and possessed a distinctive vibrato laden, singing voice. Early in his career, Short recorded under a number of pseudonyms, including Jelly Jaw Short...
.
After a period in St Louis Koester decided to move to Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
and in August of 1958 uprooted his little shop and headed north. Initially trying out a space on Wabsah Ave Koester soon bought out longtime record store Seymour's Jazz Mart. Renaming the storefront the Jazz Record Mart Delmark Records found its new home in the basement of the record shop.
By 1963 Koester had moved the shop to a location at 7 West Grand. During this period in Chicago Delmark would release historic albums by both Blues and Jazz artists then on the Chicago scene. Releasing albums by traditional jazz artists like George Lewis
George Lewis (clarinetist)
George Lewis was an American jazz clarinetist who achieved his greatest fame and influence in the later decades of his life.-Ancestry:...
, the Dixie Stompers, Albert Nichols and Barney Bigard
Barney Bigard
Albany Leon Bigard, aka Barney Bigard, was an American jazz clarinetist and tenor saxophonist, though primarily known for the clarinet....
alongside bop
Bebop
Bebop differed drastically from the straightforward compositions of the swing era, and was instead characterized by fast tempos, asymmetrical phrasing, intricate melodies, and rhythm sections that expanded on their role as tempo-keepers...
and post bop artists like Jimmy Forrest
Jimmy Forrest
Jimmy Forrest was an African American jazz musician, who played tenor saxophone throughout his career....
, Bud Powell
Bud Powell
Earl Rudolph "Bud" Powell was an American Jazz pianist. Powell has been described as one of "the two most significant pianists of the style of modern jazz that came to be known as bop", the other being his friend and contemporary Thelonious Monk...
, Donald Byrd
Donald Byrd
Donaldson Toussaint L'Ouverture Byrd II, is an American jazz and rhythm and blues trumpeter. A sideman for many other jazz musicians of his generation, Byrd is best known as one of the only bebop jazz musicians who successfully pioneered the funk and soul genres while simultaneously remaining a...
and Ira Sullivan
Ira Sullivan
Ira Sullivan is a bop jazz trumpeter, flugelhornist, flautist, saxophonist and composer born in Washington, D.C.. An active musician since the 1950s, he may be best known for his extensive work with Red Rodney and Lin Halliday among others....
.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s Delmark would record groundbreaking blues artists, particularly documenting the "West Side" electric blues sound found in Chicago. Artists like Junior Wells
Junior Wells
Junior Wells , born Amos Wells Blakemore Jr., was an American Chicago blues vocalist, harmonica player, and recording artist...
, Buddy Guy
Buddy Guy
George "Buddy" Guy is an American blues and jazz guitarist and singer. He is a critically acclaimed artist who has established himself as a pioneer of the Chicago blues sound, and has served as an influence to some of the most notable musicians of his generation...
, J. B. Hutto, Robert Nighthawk, Luther Allison
Luther Allison
Luther Allison was an American blues guitarist. He was born in Widener, Arkansas and moved with his family, at age twelve, to Chicago in 1951. He taught himself guitar and began listening to blues extensively. Three years later he began hanging outside blues nightclubs with the hopes of being...
, Magic Sam
Magic Sam
Samuel "Magic Sam" Gene Maghett was an American Chicago blues musician. Maghett was born in Grenada, Mississippi, United States, and learned to play the blues from listening to records by Muddy Waters and Little Walter...
, Jimmy Dawkins
Jimmy Dawkins
James Henry "Jimmy" Dawkins is an American Chicago blues and electric blues guitarist and singer. He is generally considered a part of the "West Side Sound" of Chicago blues.-Career:...
and dozens more would record for Delmark. In addition to the electric blues sound, Delmark would also release records by the folk country blues artists being brought up from the south. Big Joe Williams
Big Joe Williams
Joseph Lee Williams , billed throughout his career as Big Joe Williams, was an American Delta blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, notable for the distinctive sound of his nine-string guitar...
, Sleepy John Estes
Sleepy John Estes
John Adam Estes , best known as Sleepy John Estes or Sleepy John, was a American blues guitarist, songwriter and vocalist, born in Ripley, Lauderdale County, Tennessee.-Career:...
, Arthur Crudup
Arthur Crudup
Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup was an American Delta blues singer, songwriter and guitarist. He is best known outside blues circles for writing songs such as "That's All Right" , "My Baby Left Me" and "So Glad You're Mine", later covered by Elvis Presley and dozens of other artists.-Career:Arthur Crudup...
, Yank Rachell
Yank Rachell
James "Yank" Rachell was an American country blues musician, dubbed an "elder statesman of the blues."-Career:...
and the blues piano of Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes
Roosevelt Sykes was an American blues musician, also known as "The Honeydripper". He was a successful and prolific cigar-chomping blues piano player, whose rollicking thundering boogie-woogie was highly influential.-Career:Born in Elmar, Arkansas, Sykes grew up near Helena but at age 15, went on...
would establish Delmark's far reaching historic documentation.
In 1966 Chuck Nessa, then manager of the Jazz Record Mart, convinced Koester to release albums by musicians associated with the AACM
Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians
The Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians is a non-profit organization, founded in Chicago, Illinois, United States, by pianist/composer Muhal Richard Abrams, pianist Jodie Christian, drummer Steve McCall, and composer Phil Cohran....
. The first record was Roscoe Mitchell
Roscoe Mitchell
Roscoe Mitchell is an African American composer, jazz instrumentalist and educator, mostly known for being "a technically superb—if idiosyncratic—saxophonist." He has been called "one of the key figures" in avant-garde jazz who has been "at the forefront of modern music" for the past...
’s Sound
Sound (Roscoe Mitchell album)
Sound is the debut album by free jazz saxophononist Roscoe Mitchell recorded in 1966 and released on the Delmark label. It features performances by Mitchell, Lester Bowie, Malachi Favors, Maurice McIntyre, Lester Lashley and Alvin Fielder...
(1966) which received a five star review in Downbeat, and is considered a ground breaking and historical piece of avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz
Avant-garde jazz is a style of music and improvisation that combines avant-garde art music and composition with jazz. Avant-jazz often sounds very similar to free jazz, but differs in that, despite its distinct departure from traditional harmony, it has a predetermined structure over which ...
. This was followed by a string of releases on Delmark that highlighted the new music being played in Chicago by artists associated with the AACM including Muhal Richard Abrams
Muhal Richard Abrams
Muhal Richard Abrams is an American educator, administrator, composer, arranger, clarinetist, cellist, and jazz pianist in the Free jazz medium. Abrams compresses both contemporary and traditional ideas into lean, elegant pieces.- Biography :Abrams attended DuSable High School in Chicago...
' Levels and Degrees of Light
Levels and Degrees of Light
Levels and Degrees of Light is the debut album by Muhal Richard Abrams which was released on the Delmark label in 1968 and features performances of three of Abrams' compositions by Abrams, Anthony Braxton, Leroy Jenkins, Charles Clark, Gordon Emmanuel, Maurice McIntyre, Thurman Barker and Leonard...
(1968), Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre
Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre
Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre is an American free jazz tenor saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist.McIntyre was born in Clarksville, Arkansas but his family moved to Chicago when he was a child. He began playing drums at seven, then switched to saxophone...
's Humility in the Light of the Creator (1969) and Anthony Braxton
Anthony Braxton
Anthony Braxton is an American composer, saxophonist, clarinettist, flautist, pianist, and philosopher. Braxton has released well over 100 albums since the 1960s...
's For Alto
For Alto
For Alto is a jazz double-LP by composer/multi-reedist Anthony Braxton. Delmark Records released the double-album in 1970. The tracks on this album are performed by Braxton on alto saxophone, with no additional instrumentation or musicians and no overdubbing.The Penguin Guide to Jazz gives For...
(1969) (the first solo sax record ever recorded). Additionally Delmark released two of the earliest Sun Ra
Sun Ra
Sun Ra was a prolific jazz composer, bandleader, piano and synthesizer player, poet and philosopher known for his "cosmic philosophy," musical compositions and performances. He was born in Birmingham, Alabama...
albums, Sun Song and Sound of Joy
Sound of Joy
Sound of Joy is an album by Sun Ra and his Arkestra. It features the Arkestral lineup during the last few months of 1956, after trombonist Julian Priester left to join Lionel Hampton, Charles Davis became a regular member of the band, and Victor Sproles took over on bass...
, in 1967 and 1968 respectively.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s Delmark continued to release both ground breaking and historically important jazz and blues albums. Records by Sonny Stitt
Sonny Stitt
Edward "Sonny" Stitt was an American jazz saxophonist of the bebop/hard bop idiom. He was also one of the best-documented saxophonists of his generation, recording over 100 albums in his lifetime...
, the Art Ensemble Of Chicago
Art Ensemble of Chicago
The Art Ensemble of Chicago is an avant-garde jazz ensemble that grew out of Chicago's AACM in the late 1960s. The group continues to tour and record through 2006, despite the deaths of two of the founding members....
, Malachi Thompson
Malachi Thompson
Malachi Richard Thompson , was an American avant-garde jazz trumpet player.- Biography :...
and Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Hawkins
Coleman Randolph Hawkins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Hawkins was one of the first prominent jazz musicians on his instrument. As Joachim E. Berendt explained, "there were some tenor players before him, but the instrument was not an acknowledged jazz horn"...
coming out at the same time as distinguished blues artists like Jimmy Johnson
Jimmy Johnson (blues guitarist)
Jimmy Johnson is an American blues guitarist and singer.-Biography:...
, Otis Rush
Otis Rush
Otis Rush is a blues musician, singer and guitarist. His distinctive guitar style features a slow burning sound and long bent notes...
, and Little Walter
Little Walter
Little Walter, born Marion Walter Jacobs , was an American blues harmonica player, whose revolutionary approach to his instrument has earned him comparisons to Charlie Parker and Jimi Hendrix, for innovation and impact on succeeding generations...
. Through the 1980s and 1990s Delmark continued to release an array of Chicago based jazz and blues. From trad and bop to avant-garde jazz, and from country folk to electric and jump blues, Delmark's catalog covers over 350 albums and spans the recorded history of jazz and blues making it a seminal label in 20th century American music.
Today Delmark is still a thriving force on the Chicago creative music scene. Releasing records by jazz artists Rob Mazurek
Rob Mazurek
Rob Mazurek is an American composer, jazz musician, and visual artist originally from Chicago, Illinois. Mazurek now resides in São Paulo Brazil.-Biography:...
, Nicole Mitchell
Nicole Mitchell (musician)
Nicole Mitchell is an American jazz flautist and former president of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians .-Biography:...
, Ken Vandermark
Ken Vandermark
Ken Vandermark is an American jazz composer and saxophone and clarinet player.A fixture on the Chicago-area music scene since the 1990s, Vandermark has earned wide critical praise for his playing and his multilayered compositions, which typically balance intricate orchestration with passionate...
, Fred Anderson
Fred Anderson (musician)
Fred Anderson was an American jazz tenor saxophonist who was based in Chicago, Illinois. With a distinctive forward-bent playing posture, Anderson's playing was rooted in the swing music and hard bop idioms, but also incorporated innovations from free jazz, rendering him, as critics Ron Wynn and...
, Josh Berman, Keefe Jackson, Roy Campbell, Jr.
Roy Campbell, Jr.
Roy Campbell, Jr. is versatile trumpeter frequently linked to free jazz, though he has also performed rhythm and blues, bebop and funk at times during his career. Born in Los Angeles, California in 1952, Campbell was raised in New York. At age fifteen Campbell began learning to play trumpet and...
, Jeff Parker, Ethnic Heritage Ensemble
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble is an American jazz ensemble with several notable members, including Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre, Kahil El'Zabar, Joseph Bowie, Ernest Dawkins, Light Henry Huff and Edward Wilkerson....
; blues artists such as Shirley Johnson, Zora Young
Zora Young
Zora Young is an American blues singer. She is a distant relative of Howlin' Wolf.Young's family moved to Chicago at age seven and sang gospel at the Greater Harvest Baptist Church...
, Ken Saydak
Ken Saydak
Ken Saydak is an American Chicago blues pianist and singer-songwriter. In a long career, Saydak has played as a sideman to Lonnie Brooks, Mighty Joe Young, Johnny Winter and Dave Specter. Saydak has released three albums under his own name since 1999...
, Little Arthur Duncan, Byther Smith
Byther Smith
Byther Smith is an American blues musician, noted for his gritty style and uncompromising delivery.-Career:...
, Jimmy Burns
Jimmy Burns
Jimmy Burns is an award winning American soul blues and electric blues guitarist, singer and songwriter. Although he was born in the Mississippi Delta, Burns has spent nearly all his life in Chicago...
; ragtime
Ragtime
Ragtime is an original musical genre which enjoyed its peak popularity between 1897 and 1918. Its main characteristic trait is its syncopated, or "ragged," rhythm. It began as dance music in the red-light districts of American cities such as St. Louis and New Orleans years before being published...
artists such as Terry Waldo, and many more.
In March 2010 Delmark announced the release of the album Revisit by the Polish duo Mikrokolektyw. This album marks the first release of a European avant jazz group on Delmark in its 57-year history.