Bihari brothers

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The Bihari Brothers, Jules, Joe, Lester and Saul, were American music entrepreneurs and the founders of Modern Records in Los Angeles and its subsidiaries such as Meteor Records based in Memphis. They were of Hungarian Jewish descent.^{[citation needed]}

In the early fifties they launched several subsidiaries: RPM Records, Flair Records and Meteor Records. They launched more subsidiaries: Crown Records and United/Superior Records. In the sixties they launched a subsidiary Yuletide Records, specialised in Christmas records. In the sixties Modern records went bankrupt, and stopped operating but the catalogue went with the management into what would became Kent Records. This back catalogue was eventually licensed to Ace Records (UK) in the 80s and then later purchased by them during the 90's.

The companies always remained small and personally run. B.B. King has said that he always felt the brothers were accessible: "The company was never bigger than the artist. I could always talk to them."^[1]

[edit] Pseudonyms and royalties

Though they were not songwriters, the Biharis often purchased or claimed co-authorship of songs that appeared on their own labels, thus securing songwriting royalties for themselves, in addition to their other income streams.

Sometimes these songs were older tunes renamed (B.B.King's "Rock Me Baby"), anonymous jams ("B.B.'s Boogie") or songs by employees (bandleader Vince Weaver). The Biharis used a number of pseudonyms for songwriting credits: Jules was credited as Jules Taub; Joe as Joe Josea; and Sam as Sam Ling. One song by John Lee Hooker, "Down Child" is solely credited to "Taub", with Hooker receiving no credit for the song whatsoever. Another, "Turn Over a New Leaf" is credited to Hooker and "Ling".

B.B.King has said: "The company I was with knew a lot of things they didn’t tell me, that I didn’t learn about until later,"..."Some of the songs I wrote, they added a name when I copyrighted it,"..."Like ‘King and Ling’ or ‘King and Josea.’ There was no such thing as Ling, or Josea. No such thing. That way, the company could claim half of your song.^[2]

[edit] Notes

1. ^ Shaw, Arnold (1978). Honkers and Shouters. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, p. 223. ISBN 0-02-061740-2. 
2. ^ Talking to the Boss: His Majesty Mr. King. Blues Access. Retrieved on 2006-11-03.