A longtime veteran of the record industry, Joe Fields joined together with Don Schlitten in 1972 to run Cobblestone (a jazz subsidiary of Buddah) and they soon founded the Muse label. For a time Muse and its sister label Onyx were run by the duo but a 1978 split found Fields taking control of Muse and Schlitten founding Xanadu. Up until 1996 when he sold the label to Joel Dorn (who has since reissued catalog items under the 32 Jazz banner), Fields ran Muse, turning it into one of the most significant hard bop labels of the era. From Houston Person, Pat Martino and Mark Murphy to Richie Cole, Eddie Jefferson and Sonny Stitt, Muse was a classic label. For a period Fields also owned the Savoy catalog (reissuing many classic sessions) and worked with the Landmark and Trix labels. After selling Muse, Fields and his son Barney Fields put together the HighNote label which has continued recording highquality sessions in the same hard bop genre. ~ Scott Yanow, Rovi