Rounder Records

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Rounder Records is a Cambridge, Massachusetts based independent record label founded in 1970 by Ken Irwin, Bill Nowlin and Marian Leighton-Levy, while all three were still university students. The label is now one of the biggest independents in the US, with several specialized subsidiary labels. They once served as a major distributor and central sales location for other independent labels specializing in roots music, at one point representing as many as 450 other labels. In the 1990s, though, the company cut back on the distribution effort in order to focus on its own productions.

Starting with blues, blues-rock, string band and bluegrass, they have expanded to over 3,000 titles of folk, soul, soca, Cajun, and Celtic. The name was chosen partly because of its association with the band Holy Modal Rounders. The word rounder also means a hobo or tramp. One of their earliest successes was the blues-rock band George Thorogood and the Destroyers.

One of the label's latest projects is the Alan Lomax Collection, a series of releases of the work of the pioneering ethnomusiclogist and folklorist.

Among Rounder's artists, bluegrass superstar Alison Krauss (who'd been with the label for the duration of her career) was offered a number of major label offers following her commercial breakthrough in the late 1990s, but Krauss opted to remain with the independent Rounder, perhaps fearful that she would not be given the same artistic license at a larger label.

Rounder was one of the very first labels to become involved with compact discs, in 1985. In 2004, the company launched a book division known as Rounder Books.