Cala Records is a boutique label known for its creative programming and high quality recorded sound.

“The London Sound Series” presents classical and popular music in a new light. Starting as an experiment with the cello sections of four London orchestras—40 players—The London Cello Sound recording quickly became a best-seller by virtue of its uniquely rich, deep sound. In 1999 the ensemble performed before HM The Queen and HRH The Duke of Edinburgh. Nine other recordings in the series duly followed and achieved success: two further massed cello CDs and orchestras of violins, violas, double basses, horns, trumpets and trombones. Give It One showcases The London Horn Sound as a big band, in our first all-jazz recording.

The popularity of “The London Sound Series” created a demand for performance materials for the music heard on the CDs. Accordingly we started Cala Music Publishing (CMP), a division of Cala Records Ltd.

We recently discovered that when The London Cello Sound plays softly, the gentle approach of the players, combined with the inherent deep sound produced by their large numbers, makes for music which is particularly soothing and restful to babies and their parents. The phenomenon can be heard in Baby Cello, a collection of our most relaxing massed cello tracks. It has become a best seller in its own right and has led to the formation of a division of the company called “babymusic.com”. The site offers over 50 recordings, including not only our own releases but many of the best children’s CDs made by other companies.

Our collection of more than 30 historical recordings celebrates the artistry of the legendary conductor Leopold Stokowski and takes advantage of today’s superb sound-restoration technology. Stokowski expert Edward Johnson has distilled the best of the Maestro’s enormous recorded output, and unearthed the most pristine master tapes. The series is produced in association with the Leopold Stokowski Society, and the Maestro is heard conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra, London Symphony, NBC Symphony, National Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, Hollywood Bowl Symphony and the All-American Youth Orchestra.

The commitment by Cala Records to creative, well-balanced programming can be seen in the label’s practice of combining great works with discoveries and rarities. In one of our signature series—ten CDs made with the Philharmonia Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra under Geoffrey Simon—twenty-one world premiere recordings by Borodin, Debussy, Grainger, Mussorgsky, Ravel, Respighi and Saint-Saëns are introduced next to selected masterpieces by these composers.

In “New York Legends”, twelve principal players from the New York Philharmonic have made chamber music recordings for us. The series is the first-ever snapshot of the individual personalities and talents which form the heart of a great symphony orchestra. As a measure of these musicians’ commitment to the musical world around them, the series includes some 50 works by composers either born in the United States or who have made their careers there.

In addition to its various CD series, Cala Records collaborates with conductors, composers, orchestras, choruses, chamber ensembles and soloists on interesting single CD projects. You are invited to explore our vocal/choral, chamber and keyboard pages and discover the treasures amassed there.

The label was formed in 1990 by the London-based Australian conductor Geoffrey Simon and the New York attorney and arts advocate Daniel Schiffman. Cala Records Ltd is a UK company with a subsidiary, Cala Records, Inc., in the USA. The label has released over 100 CDs, and is typical of today’s recording industry where small independent labels, capable of generating new ideas and producing high quality music, are achieving increasing prominence relative to the traditional “majors”. The Cala Records team includes such award-winning producers and engineers as Tim Handley, Phil Rowlands, Nick Parker, Paschal Byrne, Paul Baily, Simon Eadon, Chris Hazell and Adam Abeshouse. Their brief is to create for the label a recorded sound which is similar in immediacy and ambience to the live concert experience.

“This release, and the series as a whole, provides fascinating glimpses of the intriguing results that can occur when one creative mind is let loose on the work of another.”

“Cala Records have some enterprising repertoire among their burgeoning number of releases, twenty of them conducted by their founder, Geoffrey Simon… The orchestral playing by the LPO is, unsurprisingly, superb.”

“Cala continues to reissue some of their finest recordings in SACD format, sounding better than ever, which is very good indeed.”

“There is a great sonority in the sound throughout the series.”

“In a word: stunning. The playing of virtually all of London’s top horn players is marvellous.”

“I was stunned into submission by a plethora of virtuoso playing and excellent arrangements...”

“Cala’s tremendous Stokowski series has done it again with Vaughan Williams’s Fourth.”

“A fine production. Collectors should support Cala Records and the Leopold Stokowski Society in their truly unique series devoted to this wayward, brilliant artist.”

“Cala has been unstinting in its championship of Stokowski. Its Stokowski collection to date, in league with the Leopold Stokowski Society, has produced some handsome issues, excellent in terms of transfers and biography.”