RCA Records

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RCA Records
Image:Rcarecords.gif
Parent company	Sony BMG
Founded	1901
Founder(s)	Emile Berliner Eldridge R. Johnson
Distributing label	RCA Records (In the US)</td></tr>
Genre(s)	Various
Country of Origin	US
Website	Official site of RCA Records

RCA Victor Records
Image:RCAVictorLogo.gif
Parent company	Sony BMG
Founded	1901
Founder(s)	Emile Berliner Eldridge R. Johnson
Distributing label	RCA Victor Group (In the US)</td></tr>
Genre(s)	Various
Country of Origin	US
Website	Official site of RCA Victor Records

RCA Records is one of the flagship labels of Sony BMG Music Entertainment. RCA Records was founded in 1901 as the Victor Talking Machine Company, and the RCA initials stand for Radio Corporation of America, which was the parent corporation in the pre-BMG days.

1 The RCA family of labels
2 History
- 2.1 Criticisms
3 Labels
4 RCA Records recording artists
5 See also
6 External links

[edit] The RCA family of labels

RCA is the name of three different co-owned record labels. RCA Records is the pop music, rock music and country music label. RCA Victor is the Broadway musicals, blues music, world music, jazz and other musical genres which don't fit the pop music mold label. RCA Red Seal is the renowned classical music label with a reissue sub-label called RCA Gold Seal. This was not the case in the days of LPs, when Red Seal and Gold Seal, as well as Broadway and pop albums, all retained the RCA Victor name.

Defunct labels include budget labels RCA Camden and RCA Victrola.

Currently, Legacy Recordings Sony BMG's catalog division, reissues classic albums for RCA.

[edit] History

(For the company's earlier history, see Victor Talking Machine Company)

In 1929, Radio Corporation of America (RCA) purchased the Victor Talking Machine Company, then the world's largest manufacturer of phonographs (including the famous "Victrola") and phonograph records (in British English, "gramophone records"). The company then became RCA-Victor. With Victor, RCA acquired New World rights to the famous Nipper trademark.

In 1931, RCA Victor's British affiliate the Gramophone Company merged with the Columbia Graphophone Company to form EMI. This gave RCA head David Sarnoff a seat on the EMI board. Also in 1931, RCA Victor developed and released the first 33⅓ rpm records to the public. These had the standard groove size identical to the contemporary 78rpm records, rather than the "microgroove" used in post-World War II 33⅓ "Long Play" records. The format was a commercial failure at the height of the Great Depression, partially because the records and playback equipment were expensive. The system was withdrawn from the market after about a year. (This was not the first attempt at a commercial long play record format, as Edison Records had marketed a microgroove vertically recorded disc with 20 minutes playing time per side the previous decade; the Edison long playing records were also a commercial failure.)

During World War II, ties between RCA and its Japanese affiliate JVC were severed. The Japanese record company is today called Victor Entertainment and is still a JVC subsidiary.

In 1949, RCA-Victor developed and released the first 45 rpm record to the public, answering CBS/Columbia's 33⅓ rpm "LP". The 45 rpm record became the standard for pop singles. In 1950, realizing that Columbia's LP format had become successful and fearful that RCA was losing market share, RCA Victor began issuing LPs themselves. Among the first RCA LPs released was a performance of Gaite Parisienne by Jacques Offenbach by Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops Orchestra, which had actually been taped in Boston's Symphony Hall in June 1947.

In the 1950s, RCA had three subsidiary or specialty labels: Groove, Vik and "X".

In February 1954, RCA made its first stereophonic recordings, taping the Boston Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Charles Munch, in a performance of The Damnation of Faust by Hector Berlioz. This began a practice of simultaneously taping orchestras with both stereophonic and monaural equipment. Other early stereo recordings were made by Arturo Toscanini and Guido Cantelli and the NBC Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Pops Orchestra under Arthur Fiedler, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Fritz Reiner. These recordings were initially issued on special stereophonic reel-to-reel tapes and then, beginning in 1958, on vinyl LPs with the logo "Living Stereo." The Toscanini stereo album, however, was never issued by RCA (it was a recording of the conductor's last broadcast with the NBC Symphony Orchestra, the famous performance in which Toscanini had a temporary loss of memory). It was not issued until 1987, when it appeared on compact disc on another label, and betrayed no sign whatsoever of the Maestro's apparent memory loss, probably because the reherasals had also been taped in stereo and portions of them were included in the final edit.

In 1955, RCA purchased the recording contract of Elvis Presley from Sun Records for the then astronomical sum of $35,000. Elvis would become RCA's biggest selling recording artist.

In 1957, RCA ended its 55 year association with EMI and signed a distribution deal with Decca Records, which caused EMI to purchase Capitol Records. Capitol then became the main distributor for EMI recordings in North and South America with RCA distributing its recordings through Decca in the United Kingdom on the RCA and RCA Victor labels with the lightning bolt logo instead of the His Master's Voice Nipper logo. RCA set up its own British distribution in 1971.

In 1963, RCA introduced Dynagroove which added computer technology to the disc cutting process to improve sound reproduction.

In 1968, RCA modernised its image with a new logo, replacing the old lightning bolt logo, and the virtual retirement of both the "Victor" and Nipper trademarks. RCA Records reinstated Nipper to most of its record labels beginning in 1976 in countries where RCA had the rights to the Nipper trademark.

In 1983, Arista Records owner Bertelsmann sold 50% of Arista to RCA. In 1985, Bertelsmann and RCA formed a joint venture called RCA/Ariola International.

When General Electric acquired RCA in 1986, the company sold its 50% interest in RCA/Ariola International to its partner Bertelsmann and the company was renamed BMG Music for Bertelsmann Music Group. BMG brought back the lightning bolt logo to make clear that RCA Records was no longer co-owned with the other RCA entities which GE sold or closed. The only RCA unit GE kept was the National Broadcasting Company.

[edit] Criticisms

In the 1970s the label let much of its catalog go out of print. This pattern affected its jazz catalog most greatly, followed by its classical music catalog.

In the compact disc era a small proportion of its jazz catalog has been reissued. (For example, Jelly Roll Morton albums were reissued; but they were removed from circulation in less than ten years.) Similarly, only a fraction of its vast classical catalog has remained available on compact disc.

In the 1970s the label pressed its popular, jazz and country records with a 'Dynaflex' technology. These records were unusually flexible. However, a high proportion of these pressings were warped when sold as new recordings.

RCA introduced a series of quadraphonic recordings during the 1970s, which required special playback equipment. Competing with a more compatible system backed by CBS, the RCA system was never very popular. However, many of these recordings later appeared on compact discs using Dolby surround stereo encoding.

[edit] Labels

RCA Records label group: In 2003 BMG was reorganized in the United States creating the RCA Records Group which combined RCA Records, Arista Records and J Records with Clive Davis heading the reorganised unit. In 2006 Sony BMG was re-organized, and RCA became one of two main label groups in the United Kingdom. Head of the department was Craig Logan, manager of P!nk and former band member of Bros.

RCA Label Group Nashville: Based in Nashville, Tennessee, it consists of the country music operations of the RCA, Arista and BNA record labels. Its official web site is at www.rcalabelgroup.com