History

In 1958, Jack Hoffman, a lyricist, composer, record producer, a lifetime member of Local 47, saxophone and clarinetist, founded Winston Music Publishers at the famous Merv Griffin Building on the corner of Selma and Vine Street in Hollywood. Jack came to Los Angeles in the late 1940’s from Buffalo, New York, working as a staff composer for MGM Studios and The Hal Roach Studios. He wrote the score for the play Louisiana Scandals. Alma Cogan, a favorite artist and a friend of The Beatles, recorded his #1 hit on the London Hit Parade Dreamboat. The Andrew Sisters and many more artists also recorded this hit. With Babe Russin of the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, he wrote Teresa, a BMI (now ASCAP) million-play song recorded by The Andrew Sisters, Kay Kyser and many others.

In the early 1960’s, Jack founded our own independent record companies: Enith International Records, Jano, Valley Records, Dome Records and Boom Records. Enith International Records spawned the R&B groups, The Rubies, The Spats, The Trilites and The Escorts. Jack produced for many other labels, some with Norman Malkin and others with George Motola.

Artists and songs He produced include:
Glen Campbell/Girls
The Four Preps/Dreamy Eyes
The Shields/You Cheated, You Lied
Los Copacabana Trio/Cuando Caliente El Sol
Merry Clayton
Ernie Freeman
The Jones Boys/Them Jones Bones
The West Winds
The Sabres/My Strongest Weakness
The Sunnysiders/Hey Mr. Banjo
Merrell Fankhauser & H.M.S. Bounty/Shamley/Uni
Dan & The Cleancuts
The Four Knights
Calvin Carter
Jerry Fuller
The Texans
Country Coalition/Think About Now
Jesse Belvin
Dorsey & Johnny Burnette
Cornell Gunter
Timmy Welch/Sweet and Innocent/Scepter
Stan Worth
Freddy Morgan/The Shimmy Shake
The Souvenirs
The Splendours/Island Called Romance,
The Youngsters/Christmas In Jail
The Dynamics
Harmonica Fats
and many more.

He wrote over 250 songs recorded in the early 50’s and 60’s by diverse artists like Sam Cooke, Lou Rawls, The Dillard’s, Sophie Tucker, Alma Cogan, Doris Day, Benny Goodman, The Treniers, Nat King Cole, Mahalia Jackson, Pee Wee King. He also wrote the theme song for Hawaii Calls, the 60’s television series (our own Ben Ross Music/ASCAP). Honored with the George Washington Medal Of Honor, for religious excellence for I Thank God/Sam Cooke, Jack also received an Apostolic Blessing from Pope Paul I for Mother Cabrini, The Twentieth Century Saint. The White House honored him for writing and producing We Love The Sunshine Of Your Smile, the Eisenhower Campaign Song, was also featured in the movie The Atomic Cafe. The song was played continuously at an Eisenhower rally at Madison Square Garden and the record was distributed by the White House during Eisenhower’s reelection campaign (LWBH owns this song and master).

In the early 60’s, Jack founded our company’s BMI firm, Hoffman House Music adding to our ASCAP firm, Winston Music Publishers. He signed R&B and surf writers, Alonzo B. Willis, Nicholas Stokes, Raul Abeyta, and producer/writer Steve Venet, and bluegrass songs by Bill Martin, Andrew Belling, Millie Clements and many more. Some of these writers gave birth to the King Of The Surf Guitar, Peppermint Man, The Roach, Wild Ideas and other hits.

Jack Hoffman met Norman Malkin who owned Lansdowne Music and Bloor Music Publishers (named after the intersection in Toronto, Canada where Norman grew up). Norman, a record producer and artist manager, became his partner and co-publisher.

In 1962, Jack and Norm discovered the bluegrass group The Dillards at their first California performance. With all their instruments on their backs, just arrived from Salem, Missouri in their beat up car, they took the stage at the Ash Grove in Los Angeles. Jack and Norm quickly signed them as management clients. Jack Hoffman brought Jac Holzman, president of Elektra Records, to hear them. Two weeks later, they were signed to Elektra Records for a multi-album deal and then, they became series regulars on The Andy Griffith Show as The Darlins. They became a household name bringing authentic Ozark Mountain Music to the American television audience.

The Dillards opened for Elton John’s first tour in the U.S. and have played with everyone in bluegrass and folk from Earl Scruggs, John Hartford, Arlo Guthrie, Judy Collins, Bill Monroe, David Grisman, and many other legendary performers. They appeared on The Merv Griffith Show, The Judy Garland Show, Ed Sullivan, The Tonight Show, Playboy After Dark, Shindig, Hullabaloo, The Smothers Brothers Show and many other shows. They have had many successful tours in Europe and Japan.

In the mid-1970s, Norman Malkin of Lansdowne Music, signed writer musician Patrick Simmons. He later signed him to a major administration deal with Warner Bros. Music. Pat Simmons of The Doobie Brothers is the writer of multi-platinum hits Black Water, South City Midnight Lady, Toulouse Street and over 24 songs jointly owned by Lansdowne Music and Warner Bros. Music.

Now, almost 46 years later, The Dillards is one of Lansdowne and Winston’s favorite groups. The Dillards have shared some incredible performances at many famous Bluegrass festivals including Telluride, Mayberry Days in Mt. Airy, North Carolina; at The Tonder Folk Festival, Belgium in September of 1999; at the Strawberry Festival in California; and at a sold out engagement with Arlo Guthrie and Pete Seeger at Carnegie Hall in 2002. The 1963 rare, classic recording of their debut concert at Washington State University, Dillards Live, A Long Time Ago, was released in 1999 on Varese Sarabande Records. We publish over 45 of their greatest Bluegrass standards, including There Is a Time featured on The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s Will the Circle Be Unbroken III and on Uncle Earl/She Waits For Night on Rounder Records; Old Home Place recorded by J.D. Crowe and the New South; Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder; David Grisman; John Hartford; and Pete Seeger. The Kingston Trio, Porter Wagoner, Roy Clark, Phish, String Cheese Incident, Grandpa Jones and many more have recorded Dooley. Many, many artists in Bluegrass have covered their wonderful songs.

The Dillards share a long discography on Elektra, 20th Century/United Artist’s/Joint Anthem/Flying Fish, Rounder, Rhino and Vanguard labels. They also appear on Bluegrass compilations such as Appalachian Stomp on Rhino Records and on Best Of Bluegrass/Universal Records. Douglas Dillard left the group in the 70’s and toured with The Byrds. Later, he founded The Dillard Clark Expedition with Gene Clark of The Byrds. Doug’s lightening banjo style can be heard in the movies Vanishing Point, Bonnie and Clyde, Bunny O Hare, Bound For Glory and more.

The Dillards chronicle is in The Rolling Stone History Of Rock and Roll, The History Of Country Music, The Big Book Of Bluegrass, at IBMA.org and in many other books and magazines throughout the years. In print, we have The Classic Doug Dillard Songbook Of 5 String Banjo Tablatures and This Is The Time – The Dillards Songbook (2005) both published by Centerstream Publishing/Hal Leonard. The songbooks were conceived, produced and project coordinated by Lynne Robin Green.

The Dillards classic standard Dooley was rewritten as a campaign commercial for Mark Warner, Governor of Virginia. In the commercial known as Warner this campaign song was broadcast on ESPN, CNBC, CNN.

Our BMI firms, known as Bloor and Hoffman House Music, have had many songs published in Surf Print books and in Dick Dale songbook collections including The Best Of Dick Dale, King Of Surf (Hal Leonard).

Collectively our songs have been featured on more than 5000 TV shows and films such as:
The Andy Griffith Show
Return To Mayberry
Pensacola
The Big Easy
The Ricki Lake Show
The Tonight Show
Conan O’Brien
Jimmy Kimmel Live
October Magical Match Ups on Fox Sports
The Olympics 2002
Where In The World Is Carmen San Diego
The Andy Griffith Show Reunion Back To Mayberry 2003
Lady Mobster
Days Of The Fillmore
Saturday Night Live
American Hollow on A&E
Baby Blues on WBN
Death In America on PBS
Eye On Travel
My Mother, The Car
Monty Python
The Cristina Show
Austin City Limits
CMT Live
Cartalk Live
Con Cierte Intimidad
Sabado Gigante
Time Warner’s ID Spots
El Premio Gente
Latin Music Awards
Alias
Six Feet Under
Malcolm In The Middle
The Bernie Mac Show
MTV’s Boiling Points
Living It on CSET
The IBMA Awards
CMT’s 20 Greatest Country Stars,Madmen,The Ex List, Riverdale and hundreds more.

You will find our songs in films from the last four decades including:
Hairspray
Above Suspicion
Smiling Fish And Goat On Fire
Return To Two Moon Junction
All About The Benjamin’s
No Place To Hide
The Atomic Cafe
Quick
Black Sheep
Ken Burns Baseball
CMT’s 20 Greatest Country Stars
CMT’s Greatest Road Trips
Vote for Me, Politics in America on PBS
The Big Easy on USA
Jacklight (Independent)
Cmon Church and Pray (Independent)
General Hospital (ABC)
City Girls (Pay per View)
Encyclopedia Britannica CD-ROM
The Face of Life Magazine CD-ROM.

Our original scores and source cues are used in movies aired on HBO, Showtime, The Movie Channel, Cinemax, A&E, Nickelodeon, Pay per View, Lifetime, DMX, TV Land, AEI, STARZ, the Game Show Network and many more.

Our publishing companies collectively have well over 4500 recordings throughout the years including recordings of:
Asleep At The Wheel
Travis Tritt
Biz Markie
Pete Rock & CL Smooth
Beanie Sigel
Justin Warfield
Charles Brown
Dick Dale & The Deltones
Harvey Scales
Judy Henske
Steve Martin
Calvin Carter
Etta James
Davey Allan & The Arrows
Benny Goodman
The Fendermen
The Gourds
The Dillards
John Handy
Judy Collins
The Alleycats produced by Phil Spector
Sam Cooke
Mahalia Jackson
Gene & Wendell
Calvin Carter
John Hartford
Porter Wagoner
Etta James
Pee Wee King
Grandpa Jones
The Chiffon’s
Orange Blossom Special
H.M.S. Bounty
Roy Clark
J. D. Crowe & The New South
Phish
String Cheese Incident
The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band
Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder
Gene Clark
Lou Rawls
Uncle Earl
The Ventures
Chantays
Surfaris
Steve Khan
Woody Herman
Kingston Trio
The Four Knights
The Confidential Four
The Excel Five
The Trashmen
Dolenz and Hart
Nat King Cole
Randy Meisner
The Inkspots
Alma Cogan
Gene & Wendell
Sophie Tucker
Benny Goodman
The Treniers
The Andrew Sisters
Ray Anthony
Doris Day
CoCo Montoya
James Solberg
Mable Scott
Fernando Allende
The McCoy’s
Bo Donaldsen & The Heywoods
Albita
David Grisman with John Hartford
Rhonda Vincent
John McEuen
The J. Geils Band
Gene Vincent
The Four Preps
The Westwinds
The Challengers
Surfaris
The Sabres
The Youngsters
and many others