Columbia Records

Columbia Records is an American recording label, under the ownership of Sony Music Entertainment. It was founded in 1887, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company—successor to the Volta Graphophone Company. Columbia is the oldest surviving brand name in recorded sound, being the second major record company to produce recorded records. Columbia Records went on to release records by an array of notable singers, instrumentalists, and bands. From 1961 to 1990, its recordings were released outside the U.S. and Canada on the CBS Records label (for Columbia Broadcasting System, its parent from 1938 to 1988) before adopting the Columbia name in most of the world. It is one of Sony Music's three flagship record labels with the others being RCA Records and Epic Records.

Until 1989, Columbia Records had no connection to Columbia Pictures, which used various other names for record labels they owned, including Colpix, Colgems, Bell and later Arista; rather, as above, it was connected to CBS, which stood for Columbia Broadcasting System, a broadcasting media company which had purchased Columbia Records in the late 1930s, and which had been co-founded in 1927 by Columbia Records itself. Though Arista was sold to BMG, it would later become a sister label to Columbia Records through the mutual connection to Sony Music; both are connected to Columbia Pictures through Sony Corporation of America, worldwide parent of both the music and motion picture arms of Sony.

Columbia

Columbia may refer to:

Places

In North America

Billy Murray

Billy Murray may refer to:

See also

Gramophone record

A gramophone record (phonograph record in American English) or vinyl record, commonly known as a "record", is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat polyvinyl chloride (previously shellac) disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts near the periphery and ends near the center of the disc. Phonograph records are generally described by their diameter in inches (12", 10", 7"), the rotational speed in rpm at which they are played (16 ²⁄₃, 33 ¹⁄₃, 45, 78), and their time capacity resulting from a combination of those parameters (LP – long playing 33 ¹⁄₃ rpm, SP – 78 rpm single, EP – 12-inch single or extended play, 33 or 45 rpm); their reproductive quality or level of fidelity (high-fidelity, orthophonic, full-range, etc.), and the number of audio channels provided (mono, stereo, quad, etc.).

The phonograph disc record was the primary medium used for music reproduction until late in the 20th century, replacing the phonograph cylinder record, with which it had co-existed, by the 1920s. By the late 1980s, digital media, in the form of the compact disc, had gained a larger market share, and the vinyl record left the mainstream in 1991. After its fall, records continued to be manufactured and sold, and have been especially used by disc jockeys and many audiophiles for various types of music. The phonograph record has made a niche resurgence in the early 21st century – 9.2 million records were sold in the U.S. in 2014, a 260% increase since 2009. Likewise, in the UK sales have increased five-fold from 2009 to 2014.