Leo Records

Leo Records was founded in 1979 by Leo Feigin (also known under his broadcasting name Aleksei Leonidov), a Russian immigrant to Britain.^[2] The label was particularly associated with establishing the world reputation of the Ganelin Trio during the 1970s and 1980s.^[3]

In its first ten years, releases from Leo included albums by musicians from the Soviet Union such as Sergey Kuryokhin, Sainkho Namtchylak and Valentina Ponomaryova.^[4] By the end of 1986, Leo had released more than 20 albums by musicians from Communist countries, including the Soviet Union.^[5] In 1987, a DownBeat reviewer commented that Leo had been "the main conduit for the Soviet avant garde's recorded output anywhere, East or West."^[6] Leo's promotion of Soviet jazz musicians helped secure concerts for some of them spread over a week at the 1989 Zurich jazz festival; recordings from the concerts were released as Conspiracy: Soviet Jazz Festival, Zurich 1989.^[7]

By the mid-1990s, Leo had introduced the Leo Lab series, "as an imprint for emerging and unknown artists".^[8] Leo has released more than 50 recordings by saxophonist Ivo Perelman.^[9]

By 2019, Feigin had ceased being actively involved in production, instead concentrating on "handling administrative tasks while the musicians themselves record and design artwork."^[4] In 2024, he reached an agreement with Phil Freeman, a writer and owner of a record label, to make some of Leo's back catalogue available via Bandcamp.^[10][11]