History
Kay was the manager of Chris Connor and Herbie Mann, among others, and erstwhile husband of Diahann Carroll. Pete Kameron was the manager of The Weavers and an advisor to The Tarriers. Kay and Kameron formed a partnership called Village Planners and from this partnership they started FM Records. Kameron and Kay ended up being listed as producers on many of the FM albums, along with Alan Douglas (who also was responsible for the op-art record jackets). The output of FM was a mixture of jazz and folk releases. The label was distributed by Vee Jay initially, and later by Roulette.
Chris Connor was an American jazz singer.
Herbert Jay Solomon, known by his stage name Herbie Mann, was an American jazz flutist and important early practitioner of world music. Early in his career, he also played tenor saxophone and clarinet, but Mann was among the first jazz musicians to specialize on the flute. His most popular single was "Hijack", which was a Billboard No. 1 dance hit for three weeks in 1975.
Diahann Carroll was an American actress, singer, model, and activist. She rose to prominence in some of the earliest major studio films to feature Black casts, including Carmen Jones (1954) and Porgy and Bess (1959). In 1962, Carroll won a Tony Award for best actress, a first for a Black woman, for her role in the Broadway musical No Strings.
Kay and Kameron lost no time in signing up people they knew. Chris Connor, who had had several successful albums for Atlantic, was talked into leaving Atlantic for the fledgling FM label, where she recorded two albums — and possibly a third (unreleased but bootlegged) album — before the label folded in 1964. Kay also released a various artists album featuring a song by Herbie Mann. Other jazz artists included arranger Bill Russo, Eric Dolphy, and spoken-word artist Ken Nordine.
William Joseph Russo was an American composer, arranger, and musician from Chicago.
Eric Allan Dolphy, Jr. was an American jazz alto saxophonist, bass clarinetist and flautist. On a few occasions, he also played the clarinet and piccolo. Dolphy was one of several multi-instrumentalists to gain prominence around the time that he was active. His use of the bass clarinet helped to establish the instrument within jazz. Dolphy extended the vocabulary and boundaries of the alto saxophone, and was among the earliest significant jazz flute soloists.
Ken Nordine was an American voice-over and recording artist, best known for his series of word jazz albums. His deep, resonant voice has also been featured in many commercial advertisements and movie trailers. One critic wrote that "you may not know Ken Nordine by name or face, but you'll almost certainly recognize his voice."
On the folk side, Kameron signed Jo Mapes, Fred Neil, Len Chandler and ex-Tarrier Bob Carey. There was also a new folk group called the Big 3, a trio composed of future Mamas & Papas star Cass Elliot along with folk singer Jim Hendricks and future solo star Tim Rose. In Rose's debut solo album for Columbia a few years later, he remade several songs he had done with the Big 3, and recorded a slow arrangement of "Hey Joe" that Jimi Hendrix copied almost note for note a few months later from the edited 45 version. In addition, Kameron signed husband-and-wife team Jake and Kate Holmes, recording under the pseudonym Allen & Grier, who did parodies. Jake Holmes later had a minor hit in 1970 with "So Close" [Polydor 14041, #49], but is perhaps better known as the alleged source of Led Zeppelin's "Dazed and Confused."
Jo Mapes was an American folk singer, songwriter, critic and writer. She was prominent in the folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s and later became an advertising copywriter and nightclub critic for the Sun-Times in Chicago.
Frederick Neil was an American folk singer-songwriter in the 1960s and early 1970s. He did not achieve commercial success as a performer and is mainly known through other people's recordings of his material – particularly "Everybody's Talkin'", which became a hit for Harry Nilsson after it was used in the film Midnight Cowboy in 1969. Though highly regarded by contemporary folk singers, he was reluctant to tour and spent much of the last 30 years of his life assisting with the preservation of dolphins.
Leonard Hunt Chandler, Jr., better known as Len Chandler, is a folk musician from Akron, Ohio.
By the time album #307 came out in late 1963, the label was already showing early signs of a money crunch. The label used for the albums had a complex graphic design, but when the Big 3 started selling more than expected, they ran out of label blanks and were forced to go to a less expensive label, in black and grey with no graphics. By the time #311 was issued in 1964, they were in trouble. Although plans had been made for the albums numbered 312 to 319, many were not issued, and the ones that were are scarce today. Jo Mapes was quoted as saying that while the copies of her album (#317) were on the docks ready to ship, the company went bankrupt. The albums that had been pressed were sold to cutout wholesalers. Most of the copies existing today of albums #311 to #319 were salvaged from the bargain bins of the 1960s and have cutout holes in the covers (or "NR" stamped on the back meaning they were not returnable) and stickers on the front reading "39 cents" and such.
Vee-Jay, their first distributor, released some of the masters on their own label, such as the Big 3 on Tollie 9006 ["Winkin' Blinkin' and Nod"/"The Banjo Song"], and the Eric Dolphy album, which they reissued several times on Vee-Jay and Epitaph (see related discographies). Ultimately, other than the Eric Dolphy album, most of the other masters seemed to end up with Roulette. In 1968, some of the FM masters were reissued by Roulette, such as the Big 3 albums and some of the jazz issues, and later they were reissued on CD via the companies who issued Roulette Jazz recordings and licensed material from the Roulette catalog.
Blue Note Records is an American jazz record label owned by Universal Music Group and operated with Decca Records. Established in 1939 by Alfred Lion and Max Margulis, it derived its name from the blue notes of jazz and the blues. Originally dedicated to recording traditional jazz and small group swing, the label switched its attention to modern jazz around 1947.
Vee-Jay Records is an American record label founded in the 1950s, located in Chicago and specializing in blues, jazz, rhythm and blues and rock and roll.
CTI Records is a jazz record label founded in 1967 by Creed Taylor. CTI was a subsidiary of A&M before becoming independent in 1970. Its first album was A Day in the Life by guitarist Wes Montgomery in 1967 Its roster included George Benson, Ron Carter, Eumir Deodato, Astrud Gilberto, Freddie Hubbard, Bob James, Antonio Carlos Jobim, Hubert Laws, Stanley Turrentine, and Walter Wanderley,
Roulette Records was an American record company and label founded in 1957 by George Goldner, Joe Kolsky, Morris Levy and Phil Kahl, with creative control given to producers and songwriters Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore. Levy was appointed director.
Vanguard Records is an American record label set up in 1950 by brothers Maynard and Seymour Solomon in New York City. It was a primarily classical label throughout its heyday in the 1950s and 1960s, but is perhaps best known for its catalogue of recordings by a number of pivotal jazz, folk, and blues musicians. The Bach Guild was a subsidiary label.
United Artists Records was a record label founded by Max E. Youngstein of United Artists in 1957 to issue movie soundtracks. The label expanded into other genres, such as easy listening, jazz, pop, and R&B.
Booker Little Jr. was an American jazz trumpeter and composer. He appeared on recordings, both as a sideman and as a leader. Little notably performed with Max Roach, John Coltrane, and Eric Dolphy and was strongly influenced by Sonny Rollins and Clifford Brown. He died at age 23.
Impressions is a 1963 album of live and studio recordings by jazz musician John Coltrane.
Olé Coltrane is the ninth album by jazz musician John Coltrane, released in 1961 on Atlantic Records, catalogue SD 1373. The album was recorded at A&R Studios in New York, and was the last of Coltrane's Atlantic albums to be made under his own supervision.
Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation is the sixth album by jazz saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman, released on Atlantic Records in 1961, his fourth for the label. Its title established the name of the then-nascent free jazz movement. The recording session took place on December 21, 1960, at A&R Studios in New York City. The sole outtake from the album session, "First Take," was later released on the 1971 compilation Twins.
Clifford Laconia Jordan was an American jazz tenor saxophone player. While in Chicago, he performed with Max Roach, Sonny Stitt, and some rhythm and blues groups. He moved to New York City in 1957, after which he recorded three albums for Blue Note. He recorded with Horace Silver, J.J. Johnson, and Kenny Dorham, among others. He was part of the Charles Mingus Sextet, with Eric Dolphy, during its 1964 European tour.
Africa/Brass is the eighth studio album by jazz musician John Coltrane, released in 1961 on Impulse! Records, catalogue A-6. The sixth release for the fledgling label and Coltrane's first for Impulse!, it features Coltrane's working quartet augmented by a larger ensemble to bring the total number of participating musicians to 21. Its big band sound, with the unusual instrumentation of French horns and euphonium, presented music very different from anything that had been associated with Coltrane to date.
Calvin T. Carter was an American record producer, record label manager and songwriter of jazz and pop songs.
Conversations is a 1963 album by American jazz multi-instrumentalist, Eric Dolphy first released by the FM label and later reissued by Vee-Jay as The Eric Dolphy Memorial Album the following year.
This is a Herbie Mann discography. Mann spent his early years recording for a number of jazz oriented record labels, and signed with Atlantic Records in 1961. He recorded with them through the 1960s and 1970s, including their subsidiary Cotillion Records, where he ran his own imprint, Embryo Records, in the 1970s, for his records as well as other musicians. Mann also ran two independent record labels, Herbie Mann Music in the 1980s, and during the 1990s, Kokopelli Records. Minor reissues are not noted.
This is the discography of singer Chris Connor. Connor recorded approximately 42 albums and several singles between the years 1949-2003. This discography lists all known first-release EPs, LPs and CDs released by the singer, and includes some live recordings released on CD containing her 1950's radio performances.
Where? is the debut album by bassist Ron Carter recorded in 1961 and released on the New Jazz label. Some reissues of the album appear under Eric Dolphy's name.
Edgar Leon Bateman Jr. was an American jazz drummer. He first recorded with Walt Dickerson and would later work with Eric Dolphy, Herbie Hancock, Booker Ervin, and others. His final recording was with Khan Jamal. He neither smoke nor drank alcohol and was said to be health conscious. He had rheumatic fever as a child and was originally from St. Louis. In St. Louis he and Oliver Nelson were in high school band together.
