Alex Steinweiss - Creator Of Album Cover Art
Author: Robert Benson
At age 23, the "Godfather" of album cover art, Alex Steinweiss
accepted a job to design promotional materials for Columbia
Records. What would happen next would revolutionize the music
industry, specifically vinyl records, when he invented the
illustrated album cover. A rather obvious, but brilliant, idea
was to create a titillating graphic package that would, not only
protect the record, but advertise the artist and the music
contained therein (prior to this, records were sold in plain,
undecorated wrappers).
"Records used to be relegated to the back of the stores that
sold refrigerators and stoves. You'd go to the counter and ask
for the title you wanted," recalled Steinweiss. "I needed to
shake up the industry, we had to do something like European
poster art to draw the attention of the buyer."
And "shake up the industry" is just what Steinweiss did.
Starting in 1939 with his first covers, for a collection of
Rodgers & Hart's Musical Hits, Columbia executives saw the sales
of the illustrated albums skyrocket, including one by more than
eight hundred percent. Soon after that 78 rpm albums were
adorned with decorated covers and displayed in store windows.
A new medium was born, album cover art became the norm and
attracted established artists and inspired many new artists to
enter the arena. It allowed the record company and the artist to
promote a visual image and identity with the music.
So who was Alex Steinweiss? Let's explore his life in detail.
Steinweiss grew up in Brooklyn's Brighton Beach area and he
attended the Abraham Lincoln High School from 1930-1934 and that
is where he started his graphic designing career. In a program
taught by Leon Friend, Steinweiss and his classmates were known
as the "Art Squad," designing school publications, posters and
signs. When he was seventeen, Steinweiss' work was showcased in
PM Magazine. He received a scholarship to Parsons School of Art
and graduated in 1937. His first job was as an assistant to
Joseph Binder, a position that lasted almost three years, before
receiving a call about a new position at the newly formed
Columbia Records. He designed all the covers for Columbia
between 1939 and 1945, a period in which he developed and honed
the graphic art of album cover design. In the period between
1945 to roughly 1950, he still did cover design for Columbia,
but he was not the sole designer. He also began "freelancing"
and began designing covers for other record companies.
As a freelance designer with such record labels as RCA, Decca,
London and Everest, Steinweiss was considered peerless. Using
his own unique format of blending eye-catching illustrations,
vivid color schemes and playful typography, Steinweiss created
album covers for such musical greats as Louis Armstrong, Bela
Bartok, Count Basie, Leonard Bernstein, Duke Ellington, Benny
Goodman, Kate Smith and many others.
His album covers are considered iconic and he designed them as
miniature posters with a distinct personality for each cover.
His signature font, the "Steinweiss Scrawl," first appeared
around 1947 and his style and album cover design is synomonous
with the Golden Age of Jazz, Classical and Popular music that
was dominated by RCA, Columbia, Decca, Victor and London record
labels.
In the 1950's, Steinweiss added photography to his album cover
design palette. His use of strange, garnish colors, inventive
lighting techniques and numerous visual puns and reference
points only added to his unique style of cover design and has
made him an icon in the music industry. By his own admission,
Steinweiss claims to have designed more that 2,500 album covers.
His later work, from 1960 through around 1973, was working with
the Decca and London record labels. It was during this period
that he developed die-cut designs and collage. He retired to
Sarasota, Florida around 1974 and remains semi-active, having
designed at least one book cover and several CD covers as well
as having designed liquor bottles, posters, pamphlets and titles
for TV shows.
All of us owe a hearty thank you to Alex Steinweiss and his
contributions to album cover art and music. Can you imagine no
art work accompanying a vinyl record? I can't, and it is a great
thing that Alex Steinweiss couldn't either.
About The Author: Author Robert Benson writes about rock/pop
music, vinyl record collecting and operates
http://www.collectingvinylreco
copy of his ebook called "The Fascinating Hobby Of Vinyl Record
Collecting." Contact Robert at robert@collectingvinylrecords
