The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

My annual leave is coming to an end and it will be back to work on Monday. I live in an area that has auctions of every sort every day. Some are high end, some not so high end. Like the one I went to today. I bought perhaps about 100 78s, of which maybe 25 were cracked, broken, and ready for the dump. I know little about market values of these records; I simply buy them when cheap and sort them out as to whether I like them or not.

Today I got a lot of post-WWII recordings (swing, popular music, etc) on such labels as Mercury, Columbia, London, (Anton Karas doing the theme from the Third Man), and Decca. However, I did get two records of Billie Holiday on Decca and a Bessie Smith on a Columbia record but not with the usual Columbia label. I also got something new for me: two early Columbia one-sided records. I've heard that having Blind Lemon Jefferson on an early Paramount label is a good find. Well, not that, but what about that Bessie Smith record? I also got a lot of pre-WWII jazz, such as Fats Waller, Earl Hines, and a few others. And of all things, two albums of 12-inch Victor one-sided red labels with Caruso, Tetrazini, Fritz Kreisler, and several others.

Now, at an auction I went to a few days ago (like I said lots of auctions in my area), I got a recording of "Any Rags?" on Zonophone. Is that considered a good find?

I imagine millions of these records were made.

Well, annual leave will soon end, and so my attendance at these events will subside.

What is odd about Bessie's record?
The labels I've seen are either the Flags or the Black version Columbia.

James

Roaring20s wrote:What is odd about Bessie's record?
The labels I've seen are either the Flags or the Black version Columbia.

James

They were also repressed as red label records in the 1940's.

You're information is a bit vague to ascertain whether they were "good finds." Many Bessie Smith records sold well back in the day, and there are many still around, so their value today is still relatively low.

Not so much odd as new to me. Here's an image of the label, not of my particular record, but of one that I grabbed off the web. My Bessie Smith record has a label like this one. Also a google search of Columbia labels reveals more labels than I had imagined.

jboger wrote:Not so much odd as new to me. Here's an image of the label, not of my particular record, but of one that I grabbed off the web. My Bessie Smith record has a label like this one. Also a google search of Columbia labels reveals more labels than I had imagined.

It's the "flag" label, circa 1923-25. If you are interested in the various Columbia labels and their time lines, a great little booklet to have is Note the Notes: An Illustrated History of the Columbia Record Label 1901-1958 by Mike Sherman and Kurt Nauck. You can get it for $9 from Nauck's, http://tinyurl.com/n2kcrc6, and it's a great little addition to your library.

Clay

I have also seen Bessie Smith records on Columbia blue and gold labels. The 1940s red label Columbias are especially nice to find in good condition. They were high quality pressings from original stampers and some of them were not originally issued.

Jim

phonojim wrote:I have also seen Bessie Smith records on Columbia blue and gold labels.

Wild find !

And here is a jpeg of the Bessie smith record I found yesterday. Also I posted a picture of a one-sided Columbia record. It's doesn't seem to be listed on the 78 online discography database that I looked at today. No, images of a million bucks are NOT dancing before my eyes.

The J.W. Meyers record is a common Columbia label, from around 1906.

From what I can see in the picture, it looks like the Myers record is in better than average condition for a disc of that date. Actually, both look like they might be. Here's the DAHR entry for 571: http://adp.library.ucsb.edu/index.php/o ... lumbia_571

And the Bessie disc is a nice find, too, two good 1924 sides with Fletcher Henderson on piano and Charlie Green on trombone.