Hy-Tone was an influential

independent record label An independent record label (or indie label) is a record label that operates without the funding or distribution of major record labels; they are a type of small and medium-sized enterprise, small- to medium-sized enterprise, or SME. The labels ...

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

that issued

rhythm and blues Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated within African American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predomina ...

records between 1946 and 1948.

History

It was originally set up in March 1946 as the Melody Lane label by guitarist, bandleader and

record store A record shop or record store is a retail outlet that sells recorded music. Per the name, in the late 19th century and the early 20th century, record shops only sold gramophone records. But over the course of the 20th century, record shops sol ...

owner Freddie Williams (1898-1955), but soon changed its name to Hy-Tone when

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

n-born

juke box A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that plays a user-selected song from a self-contained media library. Traditional jukeboxes contain records, compact discs, or digital files, and allow user ...

operator Nathan Rothner (1912-2003) became involved. The label recorded musicians mainly from the

South Side of Chicago The South Side is one of the three major sections of the city of Chicago, Illinois, United States. Geographically, it is the largest of the sections of the city, with the other two being the North and West Sides. It radiates and lies south o ...

, and issued early recordings by

Memphis Slim John Len Chatman (September 3, 1915 – February 24, 1988), known professionally as Memphis Slim, was an American blues pianist, singer, and composer. He led a series of bands that, reflecting the popular appeal of jump blues, included saxopho ...

, Crown Prince Waterford,

Jo Jo Adams Joel Adams (c. 1918 – February 27, 1988), sometimes credited as Doctor Jo Jo Adams, was an American jump blues singer, comedian, dancer, and MC, who recorded in the 1940s and 1950s. Career He was born in a rural area of Alabama, and ...

, Sunnyland Slim, guitarist

Floyd Smith Floyd Smith may refer to: * Floyd Smith (ice hockey) (born 1935), Canadian ice hockey centre and coach * Floyd E. Smith (1912–1989), American labor union leader *Floyd Smith (musician) (1917–1982), American jazz guitarist and record producer ...

gospel Gospel originally meant the Christianity, Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the second century Anno domino, AD the term (, from which the English word originated as a calque) came to be used also for the books in which the message w ...

singer R. L. Knowles, Freddie Williams' own band, and others. Robert Pruter, "Hy-Tone", in Edward Komara (ed.), ''Encyclopedia of the Blues'', Psychology Press, 2005, p.483
/ref> The label is credited with helping to establish Chicago as a recording venue for R&B music after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. It closed in 1948 after King Records in

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...

bought some of the Hi-Tone

master recording Master recordings, or simply masters, are the original recordings—including post-recording mixes and production edits—of audio performances, from which all analog and digital copies of the audio are derived from. The term refers only to the r ...

s from Rothner. Robert Pruter, Robert L. Campbell, and Tom Kelly, "The Hy-Tone Label"
. Retrieved 31 March 2014

Other labels

The name Hy-Tone, Hytone, or Hi-Tone has been used for several other, unrelated, record labels. These include: *Hytone, set up by the Indestructible Phonograph Company in 1921 *Hi-Tone, set up in New York in 1949 as a subsidiary of

Bob Thiele Robert "Bob" Thiele (July 27, 1922 – January 30, 1996) was an American record producer who worked on numerous classic jazz albums and record labels. Early life and career Bob Thiele was born in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, New York, United Sta ...

Signature Records Signature Records was a jazz record company and label founded in 1939 by Bob Thiele when he was 17 years old. Its roster included Coleman Hawkins, Earl Hines, Erroll Garner, and Lester Young. At age 14, Thiele was a disc jockey for his own jazz ...

*Hy-Tone, set up in New York in 1957 *Hy-Tone, which issued gospel records in California in the 1960s.

References

External links

Hy-Tone Records
on the Internet Archive'
Great 78 Project
American independent record labels American companies established in 1946 {{US-record-label-stub