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Supreme Music Company
Supreme Music Company
Newark, N.J.
by Frank Himpsl (from MMD 970709)

Supreme rolls, and other brands produced by Supreme Music Company, were very cheaply made, on poor paper.  Supreme also employed a trick of the Standard Music Roll Co., which was to wind the paper roll onto a much thicker spool, thereby making the customer think he was getting more music for the money.  In fact, these rolls were usually no longer than a 25-cent Perfection roll, but they sometimes sold them for 65 to 75 cents.

Sometimes you will also find Supreme rolls with custom labels, made for some of the big New Jersey department stores of the day, such as Landay Bros., Bamberger's, Ritz and a few others.    The same masters were used.

I believe that the Supreme Music Company was possibly a forerunner of the Atlas Player Roll Co. (on 5th St. in Newark), which started manufacturing rolls around 1925.   The label design is very similar to Supreme.  However, there's a gap from 1922-1925 where I've never seen a Supreme or related roll type, so it's possible Atlas was a different concern altogether.

Supreme Music Co. Labels are

Supreme  (green on white)

supreme6231.jpg (63 kb)

Globe  (light blue on white)  -- same masters as Supreme

Regent  (bright violet on white)  -- same masters as Supreme

Simplex  (green on white) -- not the same Simplex manufactured by Standard Music Roll Co.!  This label strongly resembles the Supreme design.

supremeSimplex4561.gif (7kb)


13 January 2000

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