Unicorn-Kanchana
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| Unicorn-Kanchana | |||
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| Parent companyA | |||
| Founded | 1968 | ||
| Founder(s) | |||
| Distributing label | Harmonia Mundi | ||
| Genre(s) | classical music film soundtracks |
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| Country | UK | ||
| Web address | UK Distributor | ||
Unicorn-Kanchana[1] was an independent record label.
Originally known as Unicorn Records, it specialised mainly in classical music and film soundtracks. Artists signed to the label included Andrzej Panufnik, Jascha Horenstein and Peter Maxwell Davies.
The label also released several recordings of lesser-known British composers, including Havergal Brian and Cipriani Potter.
Bernard Herrmann was also a Unicorn artist and released several albums of his own film soundtracks as well as a symphony and an opera based on the novel Wuthering Heights.
Horenstein's legendary Mahler recordings (Symphonies 1, 3 and 6) were released by the label, as well as his readings of the music of Carl Nielsen.
The television composer Laurie Johnson recorded film scores on Unicorn-Kanchana, as well as an album of his own music from The Avengers, The New Avengers and The Professionals. Like Herrmann, he also released a symphony (for jazz orchestra, subitled Synthesis) for the label.
Unicorn-Kanchana was one of the labels which released recordings using Ambisonic recording technology during the 1970s and 1980s. One of the most celebrated was Laurie Johnson's re-recording of Herrmann's North by Northwest score.
The label ceased producing CDs in the 1990s. Since then, much of its classical output has been re-released on the budget Regis label, the film music being licensed to several other small labels. Several of the recordings (including the Herrmann opera) have however not reappeared.
