The Cover Art of Blue Note Records

Over a period of 50 years, the jazz-record company Blue Note has acquired a reputation for producing fine album covers, and this is a selection of some of the best. It includes a concise history of the company and a portrait of Reid Miles, who designed almost 500 record sleeves. Some jazz enthusiasts consider a Reid Miles sleeve to be as evocative of the jazz scene as the trumpet timbre of Miles Davis or the plaintive phrasing of Billie Holliday, and his innovations in typographical design have influenced magazines such as The Face , Blitz and ID .