Status Inactive Founder Ross Russell Defunct 3 June 1954 | Country of origin U.S. Founded 1946 | |
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Genre Jazz, contemporary classical Location Hollywood (1946–47)
New York City (1947– ) | ||
Dial Records was an American record company and label that specialized first in bebop jazz and then in contemporary classical music. It was founded in 1946 by Ross Russell. Notable artists who recorded for Dial included Charlie Parker, who signed an exclusive one-year recording contract with Russell on 26 February 1946, Miles Davis, Max Roach, and Milt Jackson. Dial Records were initially made for the Tempo Music Shop of Hollywood, California, but soon relocated to New York City.
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Labels of Dial Records said that they were "Contemporary American Music", a dig at the traditionalist American Music Records label.
In the summer of 1949 Ross Russell announced a change of focus, with the label turning to the release of classical music by contemporary composers. The first release in this new series was Béla Bartók's Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion. This series, titled the Library of Contemporary Classics, was inspired when Russell obtained the master tape of a recording of Arnold Schoenberg's Chamber Symphony No. 1 from Blue Star Records in Paris, in lieu of payment for a number of Dial jazz masters for European distribution.
Russell's interests shifted focus again in 1953, when he made field recordings of calypso music in the British, French, and Netherlands West Indies. This resulted in the Dial Ethnic Series (Dial 400 label) of ten ten-inch 33⅓ rpm discs, issued between June and November 1953.
Dial also continued to release material from jazz sessions recorded earlier, but in 1954 Russell sold his jazz recordings to Concert Hall Records, sending them the master tapes, pressing lists, and log sheets on June 3, 1954.
Mosaic Records released a limited edition box-set (CD) of Dial recordings called The Complete Dial Modern Jazz Sessions.