A
Short History of the Piano Label
The Piano
label was started in 1976 by David Cunningham, initially to provide an
outlet for 'Grey Scale', his first album of experimental systems music.
The initial success of this release allowed a continuing series of
projects, some appearing as Piano releases, others (in response to the
challenge of storage and administration) appeared on other labels with
proper distribution.
The music
was focussed around what could roughly be described as hybrids and
minority music,
releases on Piano tended to have a relationship to the visual arts and
performance.
Out of the early years came the first album by This Heat, two albums by
Michael Nyman (including Nyman's music for Peter Greenaway's film The
Draughtsman's Contract) and the music of Cunningham's loose grouping
The Flying Lizards.
Piano had a second phase of operation
with independent distribution in the mid 1990s:
piano -a complete historical discography
