Joaquim Paulo — Jazz Covers

For half a century, a jazz record introduced itself first through its sleeve. Designers, photographers, and illustrators worked on those covers, and their typography, colour, and composition followed the rhythm of the music within. Joaquim Paulo began collecting vinyl at the age of fifteen. Today he advises record labels, directs radio stations in Portugal, and travels to London, Paris, New York, and São Paulo to keep expanding a jazz collection that exceeds twenty-five thousand LPs. From that collection he has selected the genre’s boldest cover art, from the 1940s through to the twilight of vinyl in the early 1990s. Each one comes with its own card: artist, album, year, label, art director, photographer, and illustrator. In this way, Burt Goldblatt or Dan Wynn share the page with Jonah Jones or J.J. Johnson. The book also includes interviews with six key figures in that history: Bob Ciano, Fred Cohen, Michael Cuscuna, Ashley Kahn, sound engineer Rudy Van Gelder, and producer Creed Taylor. It is a square volume, almost the size of a record, published by TASCHEN with texts in English, German, and French. Made to be leafed through the way one used to browse through a crate of records — unhurried and stopping wherever something catches your eye.