Women Blues Pioneers - Special 4 LPs Vintage New Rosetta Records 1980s Issues

$

40

Women and Blues Rosetta Records Set of Four New/Unused LPs

Offered for that specialty collector or a DJ considering their women’s programming for March and beyond, this set of four records issued by Rosetta Records between 1980 – 1982.  All four are sealed in original shrink wrap, new and unused.  All four have gatefold jackets and are supposed to include extensive liner notes and biographical info about the artists. 

Wild Women Don’t Have the Blues – Foremothers Vol. 1, Ida Cox w/ Coleman Hawkins Quintet, recorded in 1961 and released by Rosetta in 1981

Mean Mothers – Volume 1 of the Independent Women’s Blues Series featuring Martha Copeland, Bessie Brown, Maggie Jones, Susie Edwards, Bernice Edwards, Gladys Bentley, Mary Dixon, Bertha Idaho, Rosa Henderson, Harlem Hannah, Lil Armstrong, Blue Lou Barker, Rosetta Howard, Ida Cox, Lil Green and Billie Holiday. Original recordings 1926-1949 and released by Rosetta in 1980

Big Mamas – Volume 2 of the Independent Women’s Blues Series featuring Ethel Waters, Edith Johnson, Viola McCoy, Hattie McDaniel, Issie Ringgold, Gussie Williams, Clara Smith, Ida Cox, Julia Lee, Susie Edwards, Martha Copeland, Ora Alexander, Rosa Henderson, Bea Foote, Billie Holiday and Ella Johnson.  Original recordings 1929-1953 and released by Rosetta in 1982

Super Sisters - Volume 3 of the Independent Women’s Blues Series featuring Ida Cox, Bertha Idaho, Helen Humes, Sara Martin, Mildred Bailey, Sweet Peas, Lil Johnson, Trixie Smith, Susie Edwards, Lucille Bogan, Cleo Gibson, Martha Copeland, Edith Johnson, Albennie Jones, Lizzie Miles and Ella Fitzgerald.  Original recordings 1927-1959 and released by Rosetta in 1982           

Here’s a little background on Rosetta Records and its founder Rosetta Reitz from Wikipedia:

“Rosetta Reitz (September 28, 1924 – November 1, 2008) was an American feminist and jazz historian who searched for and established a record label producing 18 albums of the music of the early women of jazz and the blues…Reitz was one of the second wave of feminism's earliest theory writers as author of the 1971 The Village Voice article "The Liberation of the Yiddishe Mama" and was a member of New York Radical Feminists and co-founder of the Older Women's Liberation (OWL)...Using $10,000 she borrowed from friends, Rosetta Records was established in 1979. She would search for lost music, most often from record collectors. The music that Reitz discovered was usually in the public domain, but she would try to determine if there were any current rights and ensure that royalties were paid to the artists. Her music collections were built on old 78 rpm records of lesser-known performers including trumpeter and singer Valaida Snow, pianist-singer Georgia White, as well as others, such as Bessie Brown, Bertha Idaho and Maggie Jones. She also found long lost songs from better-known artists such as Ida Cox, Ma Rainey, Bessie Smith and Mae West. Her collecting covered the period from the 1920s to the 1960s, with particular attention to the Blues queens of the 1920s…She would remaster the recordings, research the background of the artists and write liner notes. She designed the graphics for album covers and included historic photographs. While early records were shipped by mail, ultimately there were more than ten stores that carried the Rosetta label. With changes in recording media, the label switched to tapes and later CDs. Though official sales figures were never disclosed, Reitz estimated that the four "independent women's blues" compilation albums each sold 20,000 copies. The last album released came in the mid-1990s, but older releases were available online and the artists she found had been picked up by a number of mainstream recording labels…In 1980 and 1981, Reitz organized a tribute to the "Women of Jazz" at Avery Fisher Hall as part of the Newport Jazz Festival. Called "The Blues is a Woman", the program, narrated by Carmen McRae, featured music by Adelaide Hall, Big Mama Thornton, Nell Carter and Koko Taylor.”