Louis Armstrong performed under the pseudonym Ted Shawne while Fats Waller took the name Flip Wallace. Recordings by Duke Ellington and his Cotton Club orchestra are to be found under 22 different pseudonyms. These are among the more than 3,000 pseudonyms unearthed by Allan Sutton in his pioneering guide to pseudonyms used on American recordings between 1892 and 1942. Organized into sections dealing with vocal artists and instrumental groups, the volume has indexes for legal names, label groups, and vocal and instrumental names. Encompassing all musical styles, from opera to pop vocals, from jazz and blues to country music, and covering both vocal and instrumental performers, this is an invaluable research tool for discographers and music and theatre historians alike.

The Directory provides an indepth examination of the growth of the American disc record industry from the introduction of Berliner's disc Gramophone through the Petrillo recording ban. It examines the histories of more than 330 labels and their manufacturers, chronicalling the growth of the disc record from a crude toy in the 1890s to a multi-million dollar industry in the early 1940s. In this process, the Directory shows how power eventually came to rest in the hands of several major manufacturers. Taken largely from original source material, The Directory reveals master sources, master leasing policies, as well as examples of outright piracy. By tracing technological developments, corporate relationships, and the effects of changing musical tastes on the early record industry, Sutton provides an invaluable reference tool for all libraries and researchers concerned with recordings and the record industry.