BYG Records
BYG was a French record label in the areas of jazz to progressive rock , founded in 1967 and published until the early 1970s.
The label was founded in March 1967 by Fernand Boruso , Jean-Luc Young and Jean Georgakarakos ("Karakos" for short). The name of the label was formed from the initials of the founder's surnames. While Boruso had previously worked for the Saravah label , founded by filmmaker Claude Lelouch , and Young for Barclay Records , Karakos had previously worked in the distribution and import of records. The label initially released singles from British musicians such as Aynsley Dunbar and Alexis Korner , but also from Otis Redding and Ike & Tina Turner , as well as from the French underground ( Alan Jack Civilization , Daevid Allens Gong ). There also was Wilma Landkroon with her hit Tulips from Amsterdam published and chansons by François Wertheimer ; also by Vangelis a single appeared there under the pseudonym Alpha Beta . The label also put on long-playing records from some of the named artists from the underground and chanson sectors ; an LP was also distributed by Pacific Gas & Electric (presumably under license from Charisma Records ) .
In 1972 the BYG company got into a financial crisis; Georgakarakos and Young founded their own labels, Celluloid (Georgakarakos, 1976) and Charly (Young, 1974) over the next few years . During this time, the label was primarily used to record recordings of Louis Armstrong , Bix Beiderbecke , Sidney Bechet , Jelly Roll Morton , Duke Ellington or the New Orleans Rhythm Kings and some blues and blues rock sessions (such as Sonny Boy Williamson with Jimmy Page or the Animals ). In January 2017, the co-founder Jean Karakos died.
BYG Actuel
BYG Actuel was a sub-label specializing in free jazz and psychodelic rock , but also released recordings from the area of fusion and the area of new improvisational music . BYG Actuel made a name for itself from the late 1960s onwards with a series of recordings with US free jazz musicians who came to Paris for this purpose in 1969 , at a time when they received little attention in their home country .
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Many of these musicians lived longer in Europe at that time and performed at the Pan-African Music Festival in Algiers in July 1969 ; u. a. Archie Shepp . The result was a series of recordings produced by Claude Delcloo and Jacques Bisceglia ; BYG Actuel was also responsible for the organization of the Actuel Festival , which took place at the end of October 1969 in the Belgian town of Amougies in Hainaut . It was supposed to be held in Paris, but was stopped by the French authorities. Leading exponents of free jazz , but also progressive rock , such as Frank Zappa , Pink Floyd , Captain Beefheart , Soft Machine , Ten Years After , Yes and The Nice performed at the festival . With 20,000 visitors on five evenings, the festival was a great success, but a financial failure. In July 1970 Georgakarakos organized the Popanalia Festival in Biot on the French Riviera , which was also not commercially successful.
In 2002 a compilation of recordings by the label, JazzActuel: A Collection of Avant Garde / Free Jazz / Psychedelia From the BYG / Actuel Catalog of 1969–1971 , was released as a 3-CD set on Charly and on Get Back Records in Italy as 6- LP set. The compilation was curated by Thurston Moore ( Sonic Youth ) and journalist Byron Coley .
BYG Actuel has released albums by the Art Ensemble of Chicago ( A Jackson in Your House ), the improvisation ensemble Musica Elettronica Viva , the fusion band Gong , the psychodelic bands Ame Son and Freedom , and by musicians such as Paul Bley , Anthony Braxton ( This Time ) , Dave Burrell , Don Cherry , Jacques Coursil , Andrew Cyrille , Burton Greene , Arthur Jones , Joachim Kühn , Steve Lacy , Jimmy Lyons , Pierre Mariétan / Terry Riley Grachan Moncur III , Sunny Murray , Sonny Sharrock , Archie Shepp ( Yasmina, a Black Woman ), Alan Silva , Sun Ra , Clifford Thornton and Frank Wright .
Web links
- Peter Losin: List of BYG Actuel albums
- BYG at Discogs
Individual evidence
- ↑ Label portrait (French)
- ^ Le producteur Jean Karakos, fondateur du label BYG, est mort - obituary at France Musique
- ^ Bridge across the cliff . Village Voice , July 18, 2000.
- ^ Downbeat , June 2002.