Black Lion Records was a jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 record label based in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

Black Lion was founded by Alan Bates in 1968. The label had two series of releases, one for British jazz musicians and one for international musicians. It released a large amount of reissue material, including items by Art Tatum

Art Tatum

Arthur "Art" Tatum, Jr. was an American jazz pianist and virtuoso who played with phenomenal facility despite being nearly blind.Tatum is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest jazz pianists of all time...

, Jay McShann

Jay McShann

Jay McShann was an American Grammy Award-nominated jump blues, mainstream jazz, and swing bandleader, pianist and singer....

, Ben Webster

Ben Webster

Benjamin Francis Webster , a.k.a. "The Brute" or "Frog," was an influential American jazz tenor saxophonist. Webster, born in Kansas City, Missouri, was considered one of the three most important "swing tenors" along with Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young...

, Earl Hines

Earl Hines

Earl Kenneth Hines, universally known as Earl "Fatha" Hines, was an American jazz pianist. Hines was one of the most influential figures in the development of modern jazz piano and, according to one source, is "one of a small number of pianists whose playing shaped the history of jazz".-Early...

, Bud Freeman

Bud Freeman

Lawrence "Bud" Freeman was a U.S. jazz musician, bandleader, and composer, known mainly for playing the tenor saxophone, but also able at the clarinet. He had a smooth and full tenor sax style with a heavy robust swing. He was one of the most influential and important jazz tenor saxophonists of...

, Bud Powell

Bud Powell

Earl Rudolph "Bud" Powell was an American Jazz pianist. Powell has been described as one of "the two most significant pianists of the style of modern jazz that came to be known as bop", the other being his friend and contemporary Thelonious Monk...

, Don Byas

Don Byas

Carlos Wesley "Don" Byas was an American jazz tenor saxophonist, long-resident in Europe.- Oklahoma and Los Angeles :...

, Coleman Hawkins

Coleman Hawkins

Coleman Randolph Hawkins was an American jazz tenor saxophonist. Hawkins was one of the first prominent jazz musicians on his instrument. As Joachim E. Berendt explained, "there were some tenor players before him, but the instrument was not an acknowledged jazz horn"...

, and Duke Ellington

Duke Ellington

Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington was an American composer, pianist, and big band leader. Ellington wrote over 1,000 compositions...

. It had a subsidiary called Freedom Records

Freedom Records

Freedom Records was a jazz record label linked with the producer Alan Bates, as with his Black Lion Records.Individual recordings were distributed via Polydor Records and Transatlantic Records during the early 1970s before the company was bought by Arista Records.-Discography:*1000 Albert Ayler &...

, which concentrated on free jazz

Free jazz

Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...

 releases; this wing was bought by Arista Records

Arista Records

Arista was an American record label. It was a wholly owned subsidiary of Sony Music Entertainment and operated under the RCA Music Group. The label was founded in 1974 by Clive Davis, who formerly worked for CBS Records...

 in 1975.

The label was distributed by Polydor

Polydor Records

Polydor is a record label owned by Universal Music Group, headquartered in the United Kingdom.-Beginnings:Polydor was originally an independent branch of the Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft. Its name was first used as an export label in 1924, the British and German branches of the Gramophone...

 for part of its existence. It became part of the D. A. Music family in the 1980s, while Bates bought Candid Records

Candid Records

Candid Records was founded as a subsidiary of Archie Bleyer's Cadence label in New York City in 1960. The jazz writer and civil rights activist, Nat Hentoff, worked as the label's A&R director, aiming to create a representative catalog of the jazz of the day...

in 1989 and shifted the focus of his activities there.

Discography

• 1965 Dollar Brand Reflections
• 1965 Fred McDowell Mississippi Delta Blues BLP30140
• 1967 Teddy Wilson Air Mail Special BLCD760115 1
• 1967 Art Tatum The Genius BLP 30124
• 1968 Hampton Hawes Blues for Bud 5
• 1968 Hampton Hawes Spanish Steps 28409-1 U, BL 122
• 1968 Charles Tolliver Paper Man BLP 30117 1 17
• 1969 Stephane Grappelli & Barney Kessel I Remember Django
• 1971 The Kenny Clarke–Francy Boland Big Band Doing Time 65.119
• 1971 Sun Ra Pictures of Infinity BLP 30103 1 23
• 1971 Illinois Jacquet Genius at Work! (Recorded Live at the Ronnie Scott Club, London) BLP 30118 2
• 1971 Thelonious Monk Something in Blue BLP 30119 1 6
• 1972 Coleman Hawkins Hawk in Germany 2460159 2
• 1972 Johnny Griffin You Leave Me Breathless 28 434-9 U 2
• 1972 Various Artists Tribute to Louis Armstrong 28 777-1 Z/1-3
• 1972 Thelonious Monk The Man I Love BL-197 2 5
• 1972 Mississippi Fred McDowell Mississippi Delta Blues BLP 30140 7
• 1972 Various Artists Jazz at Black Lion BLP2101/20102
• 1973 Paul Gonsalves Just A-Sittin' and A-Rockin (with Ray Nance) 2460 191
• 1973 Dollar Brand This Is Dollar Brand
• 1973 Oscar Pettiford Blue Brothers BLP 30135
• 1973 Teddy Wilson Runnin’ Wild BLCD760184
• 1973 Jimmy Witherspoon Ain't Nobody's Business BLP 30147
• 1974 Dexter Gordon Blues Walk BL-309 2
• 1974 Ben Webster Saturday Night at the Montmartre BLP 30155
• 1974 Anthony Braxton, Leroy Jenkins & Leo Smith Silence PA-7103 2
• 1974 The Art Ensemble of Chicago Tutankhamun 284737U BLCD760199
• 1975 Chris Barber Live in Berlin - Jubilee Album Volume 3 121289
• 1975 Jay McShann The Band That Jumps the Blues 2460201
• 1975 Ornette Coleman In Europe, Vol. 1 4265
• 1975 Barney Kessel Blue Soul BL-310
• 1977 Susannah McCorkle The Quality of Mercer BLP 12169
• 1977 Count Basie Star Power - Count Basie - One O'Clock Jump INT 127.033
• 1978 Max Collie Jazz Rools OK!! BLP 12168
• 1978 Sammy Price Blues on My Mind BLP 30201 1
• 1978 Bob Hall & George Green Jammin' the Boogie INT 147.008 1
• 1979 Slide Hampton World of Trombones BLP 60113 4
• 1980 Dr. John and Chris Barber Take Me Back to New Orleans 157.007 1
• 1983 Bo Diddley Road Runner blm 52014 1 1
• 1987 Miles Davis Bopping the Blues BLCD 760102 3
• 1988 Lowell Fulson San Francisco Blues 1
• 1988 Thelonious Monk The London Collection: Volume One BLCD760101 1 8
• 1988 Dexter Gordon Both Sides of Midnight BLCD-760103 2
• 1988 Thelonious Monk The London Collection: Volume Two BLCD 760116 7
• 1988 Dexter Gordon Body and Soul BLCD 760118
• 1988 Albert Ayler Witches & Devils FCD 741018 10
• 1989 Grant Green Reaching Out
• 1989 Wardell Gray One for Prez 1
• 1989 Oscar Pettiford Vienna Blues: The Complete Session BLCD 760104 2
• 1989 Barney Kessel Autumn Leaves BLCD-760112
• 1989 Oscar Pettiford Montmartre Blues BLCD 760124
• 1989 Sonny Stitt Autumn in New York BLCD760130 1
• 1989 Thelonious Monk The London Collection: Volume Three BLCD760142 7
• 1989 Ben Webster Stormy Weather
• 1989 Freddie Hubbard Minor Mishap
• 1990 Ben Webster Gone With the Wind BLCD-760125
• 1990 Don Byas A Night in Tunisia BLCD-760136
• 1990 Ruby Braff & Buddy Tate With the Newport Allstars BLCD-760138
• 1990 Ben Webster Meets Bill Coleman BLCD-760141
• 1990 Serge Chaloff The Fable of Mabel BLCD 760923
• 1990 Sonny Stitt Autumn in New York BLCD-7760130
• 1990 Stéphane Grappelli Live in London
• 1991 Ben Webster The Jeep Is Jumping BLCD-760147
• 1991 Duke Pearson Bags' Groove BLCD 760149
• 1991 Ben Webster There Is No Greater Love BLCD-760151
• 1992 Don Byas Walkin BLCD-760167
• 1993 Earl Hines West Side Story BLCD760186
• 1993 Sun Ra Outer Spaceways Incorporated BLCD 760191
• 1993 Mal Waldron Blues for Lady Day BLCD760193
• 1994 Dollar Brand Anatomy of a South African Village BLCD 760172
• 1994 Ted Curson Tears for Dolphy BLCD760190
• 1994 Paul Bley Touching BLCD760195 1
• 1994 Albert Ayler Goin' Home BLCD 760197
• 1994 Cecil Taylor The Great Paris Concert BLCD 760201
• 1994 Earl Hines One for My Baby
• 1995 Bud Powell Strictly Confidential BLCD 760196
• 1995 Randy Weston Berkshire Blues BLCD760205 1
• 1995 Dave Burrell High Won—High Two BLCD760206
• 1995 Various Artists Tribute to Duke Ellington: Live at the Monteux Jazz Festival
• 1995 Oliver Lake Heavy Spirits BLCD760209
• 1995 Hampton Hawes Live at the Montmartre BLCD760202
• 1996 Julius Hemphill Coon Bid'ness BLCD60217
• 1996 Albert Ayler My Name Is Albert Ayler BLCD 760211
• 1996 The Art Ensemble of Chicago The Spiritual BLCD760219 3
• 1996 Cecil Taylor Trance BLCD 760220
• 1996 Alan Elsdon Jazz Journeymen 760519
• 1997 Anthony Braxton & Richard Teitelbaum Silence/Time Zones BLCD760221 2
• 1997 Dexter Gordon & Wardell Gray Citizen's Bop BLCD760223
• 1997 Stéphane Grappelli Sweet Georgia Brown BLCD 7602-2
• 2002 The Art Ensemble of Chicago The Spiritual 877651-2
• 2002 Wardell Gray One for Prez CD 877663-2
• 2003 Lee Konitz Body and Soul CD 877667-2
• 2003 Dave Shepherd Good Enough to Keep 760514
• Bud Powell Blues For Bouffemont
• Charlie Mariano With The Chris Hinze Combination Blue Stone
• Stanley Cowell Brilliant Circles
• Joe Newman I Feel Like a Newman
• Thelonious Monk The Man I Love
• Chris Barber Ice Cream (Star-Power) 25 112-4 B
• Marion Brown Porto Novo 760200 1
• Stanley Cowell Brilliant Circles 760204
• Don Byas Anthropology BL 160
• Thelonious Monk The London Collection: Volume One