Local Jazz Gets Its Own Label
Chicago has never been known as a major recording capital. But lack of tradition hasn’t stopped Neale Parker and Ken Kistner from going forward with Lake Shore Jazz, a new label intended to spotlight Chicago-based jazz artists. Parker, who admits he’s not well versed in jazz music, will serve as the label’s president; he’s also president of Gopaco, Inc., a British holding company with offices in London and Toronto that owns a four-year-old rock and pop label called Griffin with a roster of about 100 artists. Kistner, director of jazz studies and chairman of the music department at Illinois Benedictine College, has signed on as director of artists and repertoire. “Chicago has the most active jazz scene in the country, and we wanted to start a label that focused on Chicago artists,” he says, adding that every artist on Lake Shore Jazz will have a Chicago connection of some kind.
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But with its emphasis on local talent, can the label make a profit? At least one competitor is skeptical. “There’s never a good time to start a jazz label, and there haven’t been very many that lasted for very long,” says Bob Koester, founder and president of Delmark Records. Delmark has been recording jazz artists for 40 years, but Koester is careful to point out that its focus isn’t just local. “If you’re going to have a successful label, you have to record the best national talent.” Though he doesn’t dispute Chicago’s reputation as an active jazz center, Koester says artists looking for stardom head for New York or Los Angeles. “Most of the record people are in New York, and when European jazz promoters come to the U.S., they go to New York and then perhaps Los Angeles.”
The ruling was the latest in a drawn-out suit brought by Nelson with the assistance of the American Civil Liberties Union against Streeter, Tillman, and Rush. Posner in essence confirmed what common sense would suggest: that the three aldermen had no legal right to take Nelson’s painting. Last week the judge declined to comment on his decision, but a couple of details are worth noting:
