Johann Ferdinand "Johnny" Parth (born 11 January 1930), is an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n record producer, retired club owner, musician and artist, who founded

Document Records Document Records is an independent record label, founded in Austria and now based in Scotland, that specializes in reissuing vintage blues and jazz. The company has been recognised by The Blues Foundation, being honoured with a Keeping the ...

, the leading

record label A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the produ ...

in the reissue of early

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 ...

and blues recordings.

Biography

Born in the

Ottakring Ottakring () is the 16th District in the city of Vienna, Austria (german: 16. Bezirk, Ottakring). It is located west of the central districts, north of Penzing and south of Hernals. Ottakring has some heavily populated urban areas with many resid ...

district of

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

, Parth grew up listening to traditional Viennese folk music, but was attracted to jazz records played by friends who were active in the

Austrian resistance The Austrian resistance launched in response to the rise in fascism across Europe and, more specifically, to the Anschluss in 1938 and resulting occupation of Austria by Germany. An estimated 100,000 people were reported to have participated i ...

movement in the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

. After studying art he became a

portrait painter Portrait Painting is a genre in painting, where the intent is to represent a specific human subject. The term 'portrait painting' can also describe the actual painted portrait. Portraitists may create their work by commission, for public and pr ...

and restorer of old paintings. He also started acquiring a library of old jazz and blues

78 rpm A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts near ...

records, and became keen to share them among fellow collectors and aficionados. "The History of Document Records - Part 1", ''Document Records''
Retrieved 20 September 2020 In the mid-1950s he started the Jazz Perspective

, releasing short runs of LPs with hand printed covers, as well as two box sets, one covering the history of jazz music and a second covering the history of blues music. He also became the owner of the Hot Club de Vienne (now the Jazz Land club), setting up a second record label under that name, and organised music parties on

riverboat A riverboat is a watercraft designed for inland navigation on lakes, rivers, and artificial waterways. They are generally equipped and outfitted as work boats in one of the carrying trades, for freight or people transport, including luxury un ...

s on the

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , p ...

. He played the cornet and led the Blue Danube Jass Band, and organised the first Catholic "jazz

mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different eleme ...

" in Europe, as well as leading the Alpha and Omega Brass Band Vienna, which played on left wing marches. Working with his then-wife Evelyn Hruby (1941–2016), and inspired by discussions with

Chris Strachwitz Chris Strachwitz (born July 1, 1931) is a German-born American record label executive and record producer. He is the founder and president of Arhoolie Records, which he established in 1960 and which became one of the leading labels recording a ...

Arhoolie Records Arhoolie Records is an American small independent record label run by Chris Strachwitz and is based in El Cerrito, California, United States (it is actually located in Richmond Annex but has an El Cerrito postal address.) The label was founded ...

, he co-founded the Roots label. This initially recorded and issued albums of traditional Austrian music, but soon concentrated on reissues of vintage blues recordings by such musicians as Blind Lemon Jefferson as well as compilations. Working with record collectors and music historians from around the world, the Roots label released about 60 LPs before folding in the 1970s. Parth continued to work as an artist. He returned to music production in the late 1970s, when he produced recordings of Austrian folk music by Heini Griuc and others for the Earl Archives label. In the mid-1980s he began to consider the possibility of producing albums that compiled, in chronological order, the complete recorded works of pre-war musicians, particularly blues and

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christian message (" the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words a ...

singers, but excluding those whose recordings had already been reissued by other labels. After finding a record pressing plant in

Budapest Budapest (, ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Hungary. It is the ninth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits and the second-largest city on the Danube river; the city has an estimated population ...

who were prepared to produce low quantities of LPs at a reasonable cost, he set up

in 1985, initially releasing records on vinyl before turning to CD production. Under Parth's supervision, Document's output became prolific, achieving its goal of re-issuing comprehensive sets of recordings of many early blues performers, and was also critically acclaimed. Biography by Jason Ankeny, ''Allmusic.com''
Retrieved 20 September 2020 He sold Document Records to an English couple, Gary and Gillian Atkinson, in 2000. In the following year, 2001, Parth won the Keeping The Blues Alive Award from the

Blues Foundation The Blues Foundation is an American nonprofit corporation, headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee, that is affiliated with more than 175 blues organizations from various parts of the world. Founded in 1980, a 25-person board of directors governs the ...

. Johnny Parth, ''Blues Foundation''
Retrieved 20 September 2020

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Parth, Johnny 1930 births Living people Austrian record producers Blues record producers