Verve Records

Verve Records is an American jazz and adult music record label owned by Universal Music Group. It was founded by Norman Granz in 1956, absorbing the catalogues of his earlier labels, Clef Records (founded in 1946) and Norgran Records (founded in 1953), and material previously licensed to Mercury Records. Today, Verve Music Group now operates via an association with Interscope Records.

History

Jazz and folk origins

Verve was created just as the twelve-inch long playing album became the industry standard, its ten-inch counterpart for the most part discontinued. Granz, the manager at the time of Ella Fitzgerald, had signed the singer away from Decca Records and inaugurated the jazz 4000 series with Fitzgerald's first album release on Verve, Ella Fitzgerald Sings the Cole Porter Songbook. Indeed, Granz created the label in part for the very purpose of a new series of recordings by Fitzgerald, among those the famed Songbooks commenced with the Porter set and lasting for an additional seven volumes through 1964.