Keynote Records

Keynote Records was a record label founded by record store owner Eric Bernay in 1940. The label's initial releases were folk and protest songs from the Soviet Union and the Spanish Civil War, and several anti-war releases from American musicians followed.Ronald D. Cohen, "Keynote Records". In Frank W. Hoffmann and Howard Ferstler, Encyclopedia of Recorded Sound, Volume 1. 2004, p. 571. ([https://books.google.com/books?id=xV6tghvO0oMC&dq=%22keynote+records%22&pg=PA571 Google Books)] From 1943, the label released recordings in the jazz idiom produced by Harry Lim. The music critic John S. Wilson in 1965 described the company's jazz output as "an unusually valid reflection of the jazz spirits of the times."{{cite news|last=Wilson|first=John S.|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/svc/tmach/v1/refer?pdf=true&res=9E01E3DA143EE03ABC4152DFB467838E679EDE|title=When Jazz Was Going From Swing to Be-Bop|work=The New York Times|date=December 19, 1965|access-date=May 17, 2021|page=330}} An unwise investment in a factory to manufacture records in 1947 led to the company becoming bankrupt in 1948, and came under the control of Mercury Records.{{cite book|author-last=Morgenstern|author-first=Dan|editor-last=Meyer|editor-first=Sheldon|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GVWrw0dtuAMC&dq=%22Dan+Morgenstern%22+%22Harry+Lim%22+%22Living+with+Jazz%22&pg=PT958|title=Living With Jazz: A Reader|location=New York City|publisher=Pantheon Books|year=2004|page=958|isbn=9780307487605 }}

The Keynote jazz sessions were comprehensively reissued in 1986 when Nippon Phonogram/PolyGram released a 21 LP set with 115 previously unissued takes.{{Cite web|url=http://www.donaldclarkemusicbox.com/encyclopedia/detail.php?s=2005|title=Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular Music - KEYNOTE|website=www.donaldclarkemusicbox.com|access-date=2020-04-19}}{{cite news|last=Harrington|first=Richard|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1986/12/21/best-of-the-boxes/85d83fd3-ab42-410b-997b-0fbdad5077d3/|title=Best of the Boxes|newspaper=The Washington Post|date=December 21, 1986|access-date=May 17, 2021}} Robert Palmer in The New York Times in October 1986 described it as "a much more substantial addition to the treasury of absolutely essential classic jazz performances than one could have expected or hoped for this late in the game."{{cite news|last=Palmer|first=Robert|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/10/12/arts/boxed-sets-pop-music-s-melting-pot.html|title=Boxed Sets: Pop Music's Melting Pot|work=The New York Times|date=October 12, 1986|access-date=May 17, 2021}} In 2013, a 11-CD set of Keynote jazz recordings was issued by the Spanish Fresh Sound label.{{Cite magazine|title=Billboard review|magazine=Billboard|pages=39}} August 30, 1986; vol. 98, #35{{Cite web|url=https://www.artsjournal.com/rifftides/2014/03/cd-recommendation-the-keynote-box.html|title=CD Recommendation: The Keynote Box | Rifftides|website=Artsjournal.com|access-date=21 October 2023}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.jazzweekly.com/2014/02/reissue-of-the-yearthe-keynote-jazz-collection-1941-1947/|title=Reissue of the year|work=Jazz Weekly}} Donald Clarke, writing about Lim's for Keynote, described him as knowing what he was doing and getting "good sound, with no gimmicks."