Oriole Records was an American

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 prod ...

founded in 1921 by McCrory's stores. The Oriole label first appeared in 1921, selling for 25 cents per disc record. Originally, Oriole records were pressed by the Cameo Record Company (generally not from Cameo material, however), but this arrangement lasted briefly. Most of the masters were leased from other labels, early on mostly Emerson. From around number 115, Orioles were pressed by Grey Gull and usually have unusual pairings of material, with one side being a hit popular tune and the other "standard" material, sometimes classical music. At number 250, Orioles began being pressed by the Plaza Music Company, which also pressed

Banner Records Banner Records was an American record company and label in the 1920s and 1930s. It was created primarily for the S.S. Kresge Company, though it was employed as a budget label in other discount stores. History Banner was formed in January 1922 as ...

, and whose issues were the original labels to be treated as "cheap" labels. Oriole and Banner, in common with Jewel Records, the

Sears & Roebuck Sears, Roebuck and Co. ( ), commonly known as Sears, is an American chain of department stores founded in 1892 by Richard Warren Sears and Alvah Curtis Roebuck and reincorporated in 1906 by Richard Sears and Julius Rosenwald, with what began as ...

label Challenge Records, and a few others, often used a standard set of "noms du disque" on their labels, rather than the actual names of the artists who recorded the tracks they issued. Plaza-pressed Orioles used "control numbers" to disguise their

matrix numbers A matrix number is an alphanumeric Alphanumericals or alphanumeric characters are a combination of alphabetical and numerical characters. More specifically, they are the collection of Latin letters and Arabic digits. An alphanumeric cod ...

; oddly enough, these were later to appear on the flagship Banner label. After Plaza was merged into the

American Record Corporation American Record Corporation (ARC), also referred to as American Record Company, American Recording Corporation, or ARC Records, was an American record company. Overview ARC was created in January 1929 by Louis G. Sylvester, president of Scran ...

, ARC matrix numbers replaced the control numbers. During the 1930–32 period, ARC dropped a number of their labels; however, Oriole continued (due to the successful McCrory's contract), using the same number series (which eventually reached past 2000) as well as another series for country and

race record Race records were 78-rpm phonograph records marketed to African Americans between the 1920s and 1940s.Oliver, Paul. "Race record." Grove Music Online. Oxford Music Online. 13 Feb. 2015. They primarily contained race music, comprising various Afri ...

s. In August, 1935, all the low-priced labels owned by ARC began using a new, date-related numbering system, in which the last digit (originally the last two digits) of the year was followed by the number for the month and finally a two-digit serial number specific to that month's releases. Race and

country music Country (also called country and western) is a genre of popular music that originated in the Southern and Southwestern United States in the early 1920s. It primarily derives from blues, church music such as Southern gospel and spirituals, o ...

records started their serial numbering at 51, so a

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the Afr ...

record released in February, 1936 would carry a number like 6-02-51. As the Depression and the popularity of

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a trans ...

cut into record sales, most of the store labels were discontinued; another factor was that the younger record buyers looked for specific versions of their favorite tunes, so name artists like

Glenn Miller Alton Glen Miller (March 1, 1904 – December 15, 1944) was an American big band founder, owner, conductor, composer, arranger, trombone player and recording artist before and during World War II, when he was an officer in the United States Arm ...

and

Benny Goodman Benjamin David Goodman (May 30, 1909 – June 13, 1986) was an American clarinetist and bandleader known as the "King of Swing". From 1936 until the mid-1940s, Goodman led one of the most popular swing big bands in the United States. His con ...

made up the majority of discs sold. The last Oriole records seem to have been issued in January, 1937. All of the low-priced labels were dropped in April, 1938 and the American Record Corporation was acquired by the

Columbia Broadcasting System CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...

later that year.

References

External links

Oriole Records
on the Internet Archive'
Great 78 Project
{{Authority control American record labels Record labels established in 1921 Record labels disestablished in 1938 McCrory Stores Store brands Jazz record labels

See also

References

External links