Ornament Records is a German

Germans

The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....

 record label

Record label

In the music industry, a record label is a brand and a trademark associated with the marketing of music recordings and music videos. Most commonly, a record label is the company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the production, manufacture, distribution, marketing and promotion,...

 set up in the early 1970s by Siegfried A. "Ziggy" Christmann. It initially specialised in issuing live recordings of blues

Blues

Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...

 artists who were touring Germany. Soon the label started releasing 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...

 and German (especially Moselle Franconian

Moselle Franconian

Moselle Franconian is a group of West Central German dialects, part of the Central Franconian language area.It is spoken in the southern Rhineland and along the course of the Moselle River, from the Siegerland in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia throughout western Rhineland-Palatinate and...

) folk

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

 music as well.

Artists who were recorded for the label or in some cases whose US recordings were released on the label included Doctor Ross

Doctor Ross

Doctor Ross , aka Doctor Ross, the harmonica boss, was an American blues singer, guitarist, harmonica player and drummer — a one-man band— who was born Charles Isaiah Ross, in Tunica, Mississippi....

, Willie Mabon

Willie Mabon

Willie Mabon was an American R&B singer, songwriter and pianist.-Career:Born Willie James Mabon, and brought up in Hollywood, Memphis, Tennessee, he had become known as a singer and pianist by the time he moved to Chicago in 1942. He formed a group, the Blues Rockers, and in 1949 began recording...

, John Lee Hooker

John Lee Hooker

John Lee Hooker was an American blues singer-songwriter and guitarist.Hooker began his life as the son of a sharecropper, William Hooker, and rose to prominence performing his own unique style of what was originally closest to Delta blues. He developed a 'talking blues' style that was his trademark...

, Blind John Davis

Blind John Davis

Blind John Davis was an African American, blues, jazz and boogie-woogie pianist and singer. He is best remembered for his recordings including "A Little Every Day" and "Everybody's Boogie".-Biography:...

, Jim Kahr Group, Champion Jack Dupree

Champion Jack Dupree

William Thomas Dupree, best known as Champion Jack Dupree, was an American blues pianist. His birth date is disputed, given as July 4, July 10, and July 23, in the years 1908, 1909, or 1910. He died on January 21, 1992.-Biography:...

, Sunnyland Slim

Sunnyland Slim

Albert "Sunnyland Slim" Luandrew was an American blues pianist, who was born in the Mississippi Delta, and later moved to Chicago, Illinois, to contribute to that city's post-war scene as a center for blues music...

, Tommy Tucker, Big Joe Williams

Big Joe Williams

Joseph Lee Williams , billed throughout his career as Big Joe Williams, was an American Delta blues guitarist, singer and songwriter, notable for the distinctive sound of his nine-string guitar...

, Fernest Arceneaux, Louisiana Red

Louisiana Red

Louisiana Red is an African American blues guitarist, harmonica player, and singer, who has recorded more than 50 albums...

, Al Rapone, Katie Webster

Katie Webster

Katie Webster , born Kathryn Jewel Thorne, was an American boogie-woogie pianist.-Career:Webster was initially best known as a session musician behind Louisiana musicians on the Excello and Goldband record labels, such as Lightnin' Slim and Lonesome Sundown...

, Big Jay McNeely

Big Jay McNeely

Big Jay McNeely is an American rhythm and blues saxophonist.-Biography:...

, and Black Cat Bone.

Almost all of the label's original blues LPs were - some with additional bonus tracks - re-released on CD on the CMA label in 1991. Some of these were released again on the Chrisly label in 2000 under the Ornament Blues Masters series.

Ornament also had two short-lived blues sub-labels: Chrischaa and ESCEHA Schallplatten. Both of these folded in June 1978.