RCA Red Seal Records is a classical music label and is now part of Sony Masterworks.

The Red Seal label was begun in 1902

1902 in music

-Events:*April 30 - Claude Debussy's opera Pelléas et Mélisande is premiered at the Opéra-Comique in Paris, with André Messager conducting.*June 9 - the first complete performance of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 3 is given in Krefeld...

 by the Gramophone Company

Gramophone Company

The Gramophone Company, based in the United Kingdom, was one of the early recording companies, and was the parent organization for the famous "His Master's Voice" label...

 in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 and was quickly picked up by its United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 affiliate, the Victor Talking Machine Company

Victor Talking Machine Company

The Victor Talking Machine Company was an American corporation, the leading American producer of phonographs and phonograph records and one of the leading phonograph companies in the world at the time. It was headquartered in Camden, New Jersey....

, and its president, Eldridge R. Johnson

Eldridge R. Johnson

Eldridge Reeves Johnson co-created the Victor Talking Machine Company alongside Emile Berliner, a United States corporation, and built it into the leading American producer of phonographs and phonograph records and one of the leading phonograph companies in the world at the time.In...

. Distinctive, red paper information labels affixed to the centre of the two affiliated companies' black shellac discs inspired the name. Led by the work of the great tenor Enrico Caruso, Victor's Red Seal Records changed the perception of recorded music.