PledgeMusic teams with Verse Music for classic jazz reissues

New York-based company Verse Music Group has found a new way to use PledgeMusic. It is using the crowd-funding site for fans to pre-order the re-release of four classic jazz albums and pay for their remastering and repackaging.

The four records up for the deluxe reissue treatment are John Coltrane’s In The Winners Circle, Stan Levey’s Grand Stan, Bobby Scott’s Great Scott and Eddie Davis’ The Best of Eddie Lockjaw Davis.

They are from the vaults of Bethlehem Records, which was set up in the 1950s, releasing 250 albums covering West Coast cool jazz and East Coast bop. Its artists include legends as Nina Simone, Carmen McRae, Chris Connor, Mel Torme, Dexter Gordon, Charles Mingus, Art Blakey and Duke Ellington.

By putting up money via PledgeMusic, fans get exclusives as limited-edition apparel, vinyl bundles, posters, T-shirts and footage from Verse’s vaults.

Verse Music Group Founder and CEO, Curt Frasca said of the PledgeMusic team-up, “Verse Music Group has always been about acquiring value brands and creatively growing those brands internally as well as partnering with forward thinking companies that deliver results.”

Benji Rogers, CEO and founder of PledgeMusic added, “We are delighted to be working with Verse Music Group and look forward to bringing their iconic artists and albums to the PledgeMusic community. Our direct-to-fan approach is delivering clear benefits to music labels of all genres and continues to win new partners in the industry such as Bethlehem Records and Verse Music.”