Remington Records
| Company type | Record label |
|---|---|
| Industry | Music |
| Founded | 1950 |
| Founder | Don Gabor |
| Defunct | 1957 |
Area served | United States, West Berlin, Vienna |
Key people | Don Gabor, Marcel Prawy, Laszlo Halasz, Robert Blake |
| Products | Classical and jazz music recordings |
Remington Records was an economically operated record label that functioned between 1950 and 1957, primarily focusing on classical music. Its records were recognized for having significant surface noise.
History
From 1950 until 1953, Remington's initial recordings were overseen by Marcel Prawy in Vienna, with West Berlin emerging as an important recording hub outside the United States starting in 1953.
In 1953, producer Don Gabor, recording director Laszlo Halasz, and engineer Robert Blake pioneered the first commercially available stereophonic tape recordings in the U.S., featuring Thor Johnson alongside the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. These recordings included Dvořák's Symphony No. 8 and compositions by Jean Sibelius. Despite being captured in stereo, their first releases in 1954 were issued in mono format.
Remington also conducted both mono and stereo recording sessions in Berlin with the RIAS Symphony Orchestra, under the guidance of Don Gabor and conductor Laszlo Halasz.
Within the United States, Remington collaborated with classical musicians such as violinist George Enescu, pianist Jorge Bolet, and violinist Ossy Renardy. Some of these original mono and stereo tapes were reissued during the late 1970s on the Varèse-Sarabande label, where producer Tom Null enhanced sound quality by applying updated equalization methods and improved pressing techniques.
Significant Thor Johnson recordings released by Remington include:
- R-199-168 Dvořák: Symphony No. 4 (8th)
- R-199-182 Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2 featuring Jorge Bolet (stereo reissue, 1974)
- R-199-184 Gershwin: Concerto in F with pianist Alec Templeton
- R-199-185 Ward: Third Symphony; Stein: Three Hassidic Dances
- R-199-187 Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 2
- R-199-188 Brant: Concerto for Alto Saxophone, soloist Sigurd Rascher (accompanied by RIAS Symphony Orchestra)
- R-199-191 Sibelius: The Origin of Fire with Helsinki University Chorus (paired with Glazunov's Violin Concerto)
Don Gabor, who founded Remington, had previously produced recordings for his Continental label during the 1940s, including distinguished Bach Sonatas and Partitas performed by George Enesco. Additionally, he recorded jazz musicians such as Sarah Vaughan, Don Byas, Cozy Cole, and Dizzy Gillespie, later reissuing much of this material through Remington and other labels he owned, including Masterseal, Plymouth, Merit, Masque, Buckingham, Webster, and Paris.
Footnotes