Decca

Last updated: October 18, 2021

Decca Records (and sub labels)

Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however the two Deccas remained autonomous companies until American Decca’s parent company bought British Decca’s parent company in 1998. In the intervening years,  separate vehicles had to be found to release American recordings in the UK, and British recordings in the US, whilst each was unable to use the Decca name in the others country. Pretty silly really, but not compared with the folly that followed, with everybody scrambling to buy up everybody else, until only three or four companies owned everything.

Decca was renowned for its development of recording methods, while the American company developed the concept of cast albums in the musical genre. Both wings are now part of the Universal Music Group (UMG)

Decca is synonymous with the early years output of the Rolling Stones (documented in obsessive detail elsewhere), a vast catalogue of classical music, pop, country and folk,  but very little jazz, such that wiki overlooks the category altogether.

There was a small selection of jazz releases under the UK Decca name, more pressed by Decca for associated sub-labels including the UK London label. Fortunately, Decca also pressed a very large proportion of the UK releases of early Riverside, Contemporary Vogue, and Esquire among others, so their legendary engineering skills were put to good use.

“Everything was tweaked by the backroom guys. They might replace a microphone’s tube with a MOS-FET, or change some of the resistors to flatten it out, but the key point is that none of the equipment was stock. There was always something done to make it better – make it Decca; put the Decca imprint on it. That was, I think, the genius of Decca: the people doing the mixing were also telling the maintenance guys what they needed. That was Arthur Haddy’s work. Haddy was an engineer to his boots and wanted everything to be just right and that’s what they got.”

More recently the Decca British jazz legacy from the late 60’s and early 70s is selectively being remastered and reissued to audiophile-grade standard.

The Decca Labels

Test pressing/ factory samples

1a. Decca (mono 1957) Full Frequency Range Recording (FFRR)

A labelography of Rolling Stones releases on Decca indicates nine variations exist of the basic Decca label design above, this one distinguished by the top of label text reading simply  “MADE IN ENGLAND”, which would later be expanded by the words “MADE IN ENGLAND . THE DECCA RECORD CO. LTD.” Other differences relate to where on the label the year of publishing appears: above the centre hole, left of the centre hole, or at the bottom centre of the label.  You have to despair at  admire this level of  attention to detail.

1b. Decca Stereo (1969) Full Frequency Stereophonic Sound (FFSS)

1964-5-6-9 many variations including trademark registration Regd to ®, boxed/ reversed out Decca logo.

2. Felsted

Felsted Records began as a subsidiary of the UK Decca Records in July 1954 with music mainly in the jazz and dance band genres. The label took its name from the village where Sir Edward Lewis, the head of UK Decca, lived.

Late in 1957, Felsted Records US opened in the USA operating from London Records’ office in New York and in 1958 Felsted was reinstated in the UK leasing US material contracted through its US office. Neither labels had much commercial success: the UK label was closed in 1960 and its roster transferred to London Records.

3.Tempo (UK)

Short-lived UK jazz label – given its own page here on LJC. British label Vogue acquired the Tempo catalogue and Vogue was in turn acquired by Decca under Tony Hall, who used it to issue British modern jazz recordings until it discarded the label in 1961.  The label is renowned for its select roster of British jazz musicians of the late fifties. Original tapes were all subsequently lost, hence original pressings are very rare and as a result, impossibly expensive.

4. London

Famed silver/crimson “American Jazz Recording” label.

Decca’s main vehicle for licensing and releasing US recordings in the UK, with the original recording owner noted by the letter code after LTZ – in the case of this recording Riverside (U).  Decca did love their codes.

5.Deram

Decca’s “progressive” label launched to rival EMI’s Harvest label, well documented elsewhere by the archivists of rock and pop.

6. Eclipse

Decca’s reissue label.

7. Argo

8. Brunswick label

A long-lived label which was the subject of various owners and many years of litigation.  Example below shows UK Purchase Tax code “RT” on the label and stamped in the runout, at 12 o’clock position.

9. Decca pressing for Warner Brothers

10. Decca for RCA

Product of the Decca Record Company Ltd – no warning, fake stereo!

11. Decca – Vogue

12. Decca Vocalion

14 Decca – Contemporary Vogue

13. Decca – for Riverside

14. Decca Records Inc (USA)

Coral sub-label

(Source: Discogs)

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