Johnny Parth

Johann Ferdinand "Johnny" Parth (11 January 1930 – 8 May 2025) was an Austrian record producer, club owner, musician and artist, who founded Document Records, the leading record label in the reissue of early jazz and blues recordings.

Life and career Born in the Ottakring district of Vienna, Parth grew up listening to traditional Viennese folk music, but was attracted to jazz records played by friends who were active in the Austrian resistance movement in the Second World War. After studying art he became a portrait painter and restorer of old paintings. He also started acquiring a library of old jazz and blues 78 rpm records, and became keen to share them among fellow collectors and aficionados.

In the mid-1950s he started the Jazz Perspective record label, releasing short runs of LPs with hand printed covers, as well as two box sets, one covering the history of jazz music and a second covering the history of blues music. He also became the owner of the Hot Club de Vienne (now the Jazz Land club), setting up a second record label under that name, and organised music parties on riverboats on the Danube. He played the cornet and led the Blue Danube Jass Band, and organised the first Catholic "jazz mass" in Europe, as well as leading the Alpha and Omega Brass Band Vienna, which played on left wing marches. and inspired by discussions with Chris Strachwitz of Arhoolie Records, he co-founded the Roots label. This initially recorded and issued albums of traditional Austrian music, but soon concentrated on reissues of vintage blues recordings by such musicians as Blind Lemon Jefferson as well as compilations. Working with record collectors and music historians from around the world, the Roots label released about 60 LPs before folding in the 1970s.

He sold Document Records to a Scottish couple, Gary and Gillian Atkinson, in 2000. In the following year, 2001, Parth won the Keeping The Blues Alive Award from the Blues Foundation.

Parth died on 8 May 2025, at the age of 95.