The Beltona label was mainly dedicated to Scottish music, though it had broadened its scope to include Irish music by the late 1950s. It dated back to the 78rpm era, becoming part of the Decca group in 1933. Early 45 rpm records had a blue label; the example shown above dates from c.1955. By 1959 a tartan-patterned label had replaced the old blue one, with a red tartan for Scottish product and a green one for Irish. Early records had the typical Decca three-pronged push-out centres (2). Singles were numbered in the 2000s: Scottish ones were prefixed 'BL', Irish ones 'BE'. EPs were numbered in the 0s (starting at 1); again there were different prefixes for the different sources, 'SEP' for Scottish, 'IEP' for Irish. In the '70s Beltona appears to have concentrated on issuing albums, and only the few singles that are listed below were released during that decade. It issued its last single, the Jim MacLeod one pictured above (7), in May 1974, but continued to release albums for some time afterwards. The company sleeve (10) dates from 1959; the blue-labelled single was in the brown sleeve shown (9) when it reached me, but may have picked it up on the way.
Copyright 2006 Robert Lyons.