Mutel Library Services

[apmnut]

I'm seeking information on this American label, one which has recently intrigued me. Here's what I know about it:

-it was founded in 1951 by Dave Chudnow, and was active throughout the 50s and early 60s.
-a number of tracks were reused film score, but much of it was re-recorded in France and slightly "revised" (i.e. a few notes changed, making it a "new" cue)
-composers for this label included Joseph Mullendore, Leon Klatzkin (who Mahlon Merrick, Herb Taylor, Herschel Burke Gilbert, George Tizipine, Billy May, Marc Lanjean, Paul Sawtell, Bert Shefter, Jackie Pierre, Pierre Domot, Georges Varenne, and Joseph Solon, among others.
-some of these cues might have been licensed from a French library, but not sure
-Capitol Records acquired part of (maybe all of?) this library for their "Q" series of transcription 78s, used on radio shows like "Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar" and "Barrie Craig: Confidental Investigator"
-TV shows which used this label included Beany and Cecil, The Adventures of Superman, Mr. District Attorney, Racket Squad, Boston Blackie and The Great Gildersleeve, among others.
-the library seems to have adapted a prefix system similar to Hi-Q, only based on the mood of the cue rather than by composer (FI= fight, MYS= mysterioso are the only ones I know about)
-these cues likely were sold as a package with the David Gordon and Omar libraries by Capitol
-kind of like how some library tracks were released commercially as well, some Mutel pieces were published in the form of sheet music and arrangements for marching bands

Any additional info is appreciated. Composer credits from ClassicThemes.com and BMI.

[apmnut]

US library under Byron Music Co. (BMI) and Loma Vista Publishing Company (ASCAP), and probably the music library I've been curious about the most for a while now, nowadays most well known for providing much of the music in the George Reeves "Adventures of Superman" TV series and the iteration of the radio series "Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar" starring Bob Bailey, as well as having one singular track revived for use in "The Ren & Stimpy Show".

The library was founded in 1951 by music editor David Chudnow, and originally consisted of scores written for various "B" movies that Chudnow performed that duty on by such composers as Herschel Gilbert, Joe Mullendore, Mahlon Merrick and Rudy Schrager, supplemented by newly recorded music by these men performed by Georges Tzipine's orchestra in Paris (who also conducted reworked and re-recorded versions of several B-movie cues from these and presumably other composers). Tzipine himself also receives credit for various compositions that wound up in Mutel's library on BMI's database along with various other French composers listed at a further point in this post. Allegedly his name was plastered over the work of other composers (editor Leon Klatzkin seems to have been the same way) but I wonder if he contributed much of his own music to the company he licensed to them along with that of his fellow Frenchmen.

The library continued to expand throughout the 50s and 60s (contributing several of its cues to the Capitol Transcriptions radio service library) and was one of the more popular music libraries in the US during the television boom of the early 50s, but usage of its catalogue waned over time with the introduction of Capitol's "Hi-Q" library, the British libraries Emil Ascher distributed in the US and other libraries which had a more modern sound. However, its catalogue was picked up by the A. Schroeder company in September of 1970 along with the British Ember Mood Music Library and offered newly organized LP releases of a reasonable chunk of the library (excluding whatever the library no longer had the rights to, I presume) to clients as well as cassette tapes of the same material. Those LPs are listed below (and for some reason have "Robbins Library Services" printed on the label and Mutel's name stuck on as a sticker). No composers are credited at all on these discs (nor are titles, only whatever internal catalogue number a cue had, although titles are given in the catalog, and only a few public domain tunes have Marlin Skiles and "A. Morton" credited in the catalogue as arrangers), but it seems a lot of the library was divided up into packages corresponding numerically to a specific composer:
3xxx = ???
4xxx = ???
5xxx = ???
6xxx = ???
7xxx = ???
11xxx = ???
13xxx = ???
14xxx = Herschel Burke Gilbert
16xxx = ???
17xxxx = ???
18xxx = ??? (most of these cues are listed as "28xxx" tracks for some reason in the catalog)
19xxx = ???
21xxx = ???
22xxx = Marlin Skiles/Arthur Morton
DC xxx = ???
REG xxx = ???
X = ???

And with no further ado, the list of albums!
Accordion Solos Disc 1
Bugle Calls and Fanfares/Calliope & Carousel/Circus Marches
City Background Disc 1
Chases - Fights Discs 1-10
Comedy Backgrounds/Humourso Discs 1-13
Dance Bands/Dance Background Discs 1-6
Documentary End Titles/Military Montage
Dramatic Background Discs 1-29
Dramatic Bridges Discs 1-6
Dramatic End Titles Discs 1-3
Dramatic Main Titles Discs 1-2
Far East & Middle East Disc 1
Foreign Atmosphere Disc 1
Guitar Solo/Harp Solo Disc 1
Harmonica Solo/Jews Harp/Harpsichord/Music Box Solo Disc 1
Main Titles (6300 Series) Disc 1
Marches Discs 1-4
Melodic Background Discs 1-7
Melodic and Comedy/Humorous Bridges Discs 1-11
Melodic and Comedy Tags Disc 1
End Titles Melodic/Melodic End Titles/Melodic and Humorous End Titles Discs 1-3
Main Titles - Melodic/Melodic Main Titles Discs 1-2
Miscellaneous Discs 1-2
Musical Sound Effects Discs 1-2
Mysteriouso Discs 1-9
Percussion Solo Discs 1-3
Piano Solo Discs 1-3
Progressive Jazz Discs 1-2
Public Domain Discs 1-2
Religioso Disc 1
Romantic Background Discs 1-10
Scenic/Scenic Background Discs 1-5
Small Orchestra Combinations Discs 1-3
Western Background Discs 1-5

As it is, many of these cues beyond what was featured on the soundtrack CD of the "Superman" series and a few selected 78s from the Capitol Transcriptions library remain unavailable (if anyone here ever finds or has one of these albums and wants to share them, let me know!), but the Gilbert "14xxx" cues have been digitized as part of his collection of master tapes for his scores housed at UCLA.

Known composers for this library (per ASCAP and BMI databases):
Alexander Courage
Pierre Domot
Serge Dupre
Irving Gertz
Herschel Gilbert (aka “Herman Burke”)
Joseph Hooven
Leon Klatzkin
Arthur Lange
Marc Lanjean
Guy Luypearts
Billy May
Mahlon Merrick (aka “Gene La Grande”)
Arthur Morton
Joseph Mullendore (aka “George Lee”)
Gaetano Olivero
Byron Ross (pseu. for someone else?)
Hans Salter
Siegfried Sawatzki
Paul Sawtell
Rudy Schrager
Bert Shefter
Marlin Skiles
Joseph Solon
Max Steiner
Herb Taylor
Georges Tzipine
Georges Van Parys
Georges Varenne


A huge tip of the hat to "Bevcats" on Discogs for supplying me with a rare catalog for this mighty library sometime ago.

[apmnut]

Made an edit to the OP to include the list of composers who contributed to this library I mentioned but somehow never added up to now.

[Mr]

Odd, "Gaetano Olivero" is probably Italian soundtrack composer Nino Oliviero. Do you know if some of these cues were licensed? Same with the French names.

[apmnut]

I can't say I know for sure where the French cues may have originated from, but there's an album on the Kosinus library entitled "Cine Panorama" with a selection of archival music with Tzipine co-credited as composer with Maurice Jeanjean from an unknown source that could very well have been Mutel music. Another thought is that they may have been from the same source as the cues composed by various Frenchmen featured on the KPM 78s (Maurice Jarre, Lanjean, Van Parys, etc.).