Trumpet Records

1950s label from Jackson, Mississippi. Though only in business from 1950 to 1955, the label was influential in the recording of blues music. The label was run by Lillian McMurry and her husband Willard, who set up the recording facility in her husband’s furniture and radio repair shop, the Record Mart, at 309 North Farish Street in Jackson, MS, in 1950, and later converted the back room into a recording studio. The Record Mart also came to serve as the headquarters for Diamond Record Company, Trumpet Records, Globe Music and Globe Records. On April 3, 1950, the McMurrys brought the St. Andrews Gospelaires into a local radio station (WRBC) for Trumpet’s first recording session. During the next three years, Trumpet utilized sixteen different studios, in Jackson and other cities, before Lillian McMurry began in-house recording, first at the McMurrys’ State Furniture Company at 211 South State Street, and then at Diamond Studio in this building. The primary artist on the Trumpet label was Alex "Rice" Miller aka Sonny Boy Williamson aka Sonny Boy Williamson (2), who had eleven records released between 1951 and 1955, the label’s final year of operation. The McMurrys continued to record country artists for their Globe label until 1956. One of the employees of the radio repair shop was Elmore James, whose “Dust My Broom” was the only Trumpet record to reach the national rhythm & blues charts of Billboard magazine (in April 1952), but other records by Williamson and Willie Love appeared on regional charts as far away as California and Colorado. Among other artists who recorded for Trumpet were bluesmen Jerry McCain, Big Joe Williams, Tiny Kennedy, Luther Huff, Arthur Crudup (Crudup recorded for the label using the alias Elmer James (3)), Clayton Love, Willie Love, Wally Mercer, and Sherman Johnson; gospel groups such as the Southern Sons and the Blue Jay Gospel Singers; and country singers, including Lucky Joe Almond and Jimmy Swan. Many Trumpet original 45s will have 3 circular push marks on the label.