From:   "Dik de Heer" 
Date:  Thu Oct 3, 2002  2:09 am
Subject:  Born To Be With You : Johnny Vincent
 
JOHNNY VINCENT

Born John Vincent Imbragulio, 3 October 1927, Hattiesburg, Mississippi
Died 4 February 2000, Jackson, Mississippi

The name Johnny Vincent is more or less synonymous with Ace Records,
a label that he founded in August 1955. Ace was the first local label of note
in New Orleans, even though it was operated out of Jackson Mississippi,
196 miles away. It was there that Vincent opened a record shop in the late
forties and started the Champion label in the early fifties. Art Rupe offered
him a job as A&R man at Specialty and in that capacity, Johnny worked
with artists such as John Lee Hooker, Earl King, Frankie Lee Sims and
Huey Smith, but his biggest success was with Guitar Slim and "The Things
I Used To Do", an R&B # 1 in 1954. Apparently the split with Rupe (in 1955)
was less than amicable.
Ace enjoyed several national hits in the late 1950s, such as Huey "Piano"
Smith's "Rockin' Pneumonia & Boogie Woogie Flu," a series of Jimmy Clanton
hits, and Frankie Ford's "Sea Cruise," but by 1962, Ace's fortunes were on
the wane. Vincent tried to get better distribution of his product by signing
a five year distribution deal with the much larger Vee-Jay Records in Chicago.
Ace was to be maintained as a separate label and Vincent was also to produce
for Vee-Jay. This marriage produced only one hit of note, Jimmy Clanton's
"Venus In Blue Jeans." Within months of the signing of the deal, Vee-Jay was
beset by their own problems, and Vee-Jay essentially collapsed in 1965. Ace
became a small regional label with the release of a few more records, but
soon Johnny Vincent gave up the record business in favour of other interests.

Because of intense interest in the Ace label by record collectors and music
historians, Vincent reactivated the label in 1971 to produce some new music
and reissue the treasures from the label's vault. Through the 1970s and 1980s,
Vincent kept the label alive by reissuing old material along with a few new
recordings, and by leasing the masters to other labels (notably Ace Records UK).


In 1997, Vincent sold the label to Music Collection International, a British
label, and producer Bob Fisher began mining the catalog for CD release on
his Westside label. I think it's safe to say that every Ace track of
significance
has been reissued and is currently available on Westside.
In its time Ace released the very best in New Orleans rock 'n' roll. Almost all
the records were cut at Cosimo Matassa's studio, with the famous Studio band.
Vincent continued to live in Jackson until his death in 2000.

More info: http://www.bluesworld.com/Vincent.html
Interview: http://historicaltextarchive.com/USA/vincent.html

Recommended listening: The Ace Story, Vol. 1-5 (Ace CD 2031-2035).