For Prestige Records, 2009 marks the 60th anniversary. Bob Weinstock, who produced most of the label's records, founded the label in 1949.

The history of Prestige is surely worth celebrating. It is one of the few jazz labels to have released seminal work by what's been called "the Mount Rushmore of jazz:" Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk and Sonny Rollins. Reviewing their Prestige discographies -- just for starters, Bags' Groove (Davis), Lush Life (Coltrane) and Saxophone Colossus (Rollins) -- charts the course of jazz from the Eisenhower era to more fractious modern times ushered in by Eric Dolphy and others.

Of course, the Prestige catalog also offers other artists and styles. Weinstock more than recognized the value of the jam session: Prestige all-star jam recordings like Tenor Conclave, and sets featuring saxophonists Sonny Stitt and Gene "Jug" Ammons with various all-star ensembles, proved remarkable for retaining so much spontaneous, collegial intensity. The label even scored hit pop vocal records with Mose Allison's "The Seventh Son" and Etta Jones' exquisite "Don't Go to Strangers."

Subsequent generations have dug more earthy, funky pleasures. In the mid-'90s, the label was among the first to celebrate the reciprocal impact between jazz and sampling hip-hoppers and rappers through thick and hot Prestige groove compilations from Boogaloo Joe Jones, Pucho & His Latin Soul Brothers, and the original funky drummer, Bernard "Pretty" Purdie, plus others in its Legends of Acid Jazz series.

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