Gusto Records - History

History

Gusto was founded in 1973 by Moe Lytle and songwriter Tommy Hill, who owned the Stop Records label. Gayron "Moe" Lytle bought Tommy Hill's interest in the company, along with the Stop Records label. Tommy Hill operated the business while Moe was still in St. Louis. In 1974, Moe Lytle moved to Nashville, and bought Tommy Hill's portion shortly thereafter. It acquired Starday-King Records from Tennessee Recording & Publishing, which was owned by Freddy Bienstock, Hal Neely, Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller in 1975. In the late 70's, Gusto purchased the Chart and Ovation catalog. Gusto acquired the Musicor, Scepter and Wand catalogues from the bankrupt Springboard International Records in 1984 from Jay-Koala, along with many masters that were recorded by Springboard themselves. Gusto also acquired Little Darlin' Records, and a large classical catalog in the same purchase. The Indigo and Audiograph masters were added in the '80s. The most recent acquisitions were the Mel Street masters, the Step One master catalog, and the Attereim masters which included a large bluegrass catalog.

Gusto Records owns the longest operating recording studio in Nashville. Best known as Starday Studios, it opened in 1952 and is still used today in 2008 for transferring some of the older style masters to other formats, and some new recordings.

Gusto Records first signed artist Red Sovine in 1974. The first huge hit recorded and distributed by Gusto Records was Red Sovine's single, "Teddy Bear", which was released in 1976 using the Starday label, and rose to #1 on the charts in 7 weeks, which was the fastest rise to the #1 position for any 45rpm record released before or since, and even rose to #40 on the pop charts. Most recently, Gusto Records released new material recorded by Porter Wagoner in the 5 years prior to his death. - - Gusto Records does all of their own licensing, both master licensing and sync licensing, under the name Gusto Music Licensing. See entries for Starday Records and King Records for more information on their origins.