Don Schlitten (born March 4, 1932) is an American

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

record producer. Signal Records was founded in 1955 by Jules Colomby (assisted by Schlitten) with Harold Goldberg. His credits for Signal included work with

Duke Jordan Irving Sidney "Duke" Jordan (April 1, 1922 – August 8, 2006) was an American jazz pianist. Biography Jordan was born in New York and raised in Brooklyn where he attended Boys High School. An imaginative and gifted pianist, Jordan was a regul ...

Gigi Gryce Gigi Gryce (born George General Grice Jr.; November 28, 1925 – March 14, 1983), later Basheer Qusim, was an American jazz saxophonist, flautist, clarinetist, composer, arranger, and educator. While his performing career was relatively short, ...

, and

Red Rodney Robert Roland Chudnick (September 27, 1927 – May 27, 1994), known professionally as Red Rodney, was an American jazz trumpeter. Biography Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he became a professional musician at 15, working in the mid-1940 ...

. Signal was sold to Savoy Records in the late 1950s, and after this, Schlitten worked as a freelance producer through the 1960s, including for a period, at Prestige Records. He and Joe Fields co-founded

Cobblestone Records Cobblestone Records was an American jazz record label founded by Joe Fields in New York City in 1972. Cobblestone had two successive incarnations. The earlier was in 1968–69 as a singles label, subsidiary of Buddah Records. (The Joe Thomas LP ...

in 1972, producing Sonny Stitt and the

Newport Jazz Festival The Newport Jazz Festival is an annual American multi-day jazz music festival held every summer in Newport, Rhode Island. Elaine Lorillard established the festival in 1954, and she and husband Louis Lorillard financed it for many years. They hir ...

1972 releases from the label. He and Fields also worked together at

Muse Records Muse Records was a jazz record company and label founded in New York City by Joe Fields (producer), Joe Fields in 1972. Fields worked as an executive for Prestige Records in the 1960s. Several of the albums were previously released on Cobbleston ...

and Onyx Records. Fields and Schlitten ceased working together in the mid-1970s; Fields continued at Muse, and Schlitten founded

Xanadu Records Xanadu Records was a jazz record label founded in 1975 by Don Schlitten. It was most active during the 1970s and 1980s and stopped recording in the 1990s. The catalogue was bought by emusic in 1999, but no new music was produced. In 2007, the cat ...

, where he produced

Barry Harris Barry Doyle Harris (December 15, 1929 – December 8, 2021) was an American jazz pianist, bandleader, composer, arranger, and educator. He was an exponent of the bebop style. Life and career Harris was born in Detroit, Michigan, on December ...

Al Cohn Al Cohn (November 24, 1925 – February 15, 1988) was an American jazz saxophonist, arranger and composer. He came to prominence in the band of clarinetist Woody Herman and was known for his longtime musical partnership with fellow saxophonist ...

, and Charles McPherson, among others. He also oversaw the reissue of many early

bebop Bebop or bop is a style of jazz developed in the early-to-mid-1940s in the United States. The style features compositions characterized by a fast tempo, complex chord progressions with rapid chord changes and numerous changes of key, instrumen ...

sessions. Aside from production work, Schlitten had extensive credits as a writer of

liner notes Liner notes (also sleeve notes or album notes) are the writings found on the sleeves of LP record albums and in booklets that come inserted into the compact disc jewel case or the equivalent packaging for cassettes. Origin Liner notes are desc ...

References

* Don Schlittenat

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databa ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schlitten, Don 1932 births Living people American record producers Jazz record producers Place of birth missing (living people)