Following a 15-year career that included gigs with such acclaimed jazz and blues artists as James Moody, Eddie Harris, Doc Cheatham, Clark Terry, Joe Williams, Little Jimmy Scott, Gunther Schuller's Ellington Repertory Orchestra and others, drummer Michael Friedman hung up his sticks and launched Premonition Records in August of 1993. The label developed slowly. Its first four years produced four releases, mostly from artists who live and work out of Premonition's base of operations, Chicago, Illinois. 1994's cafe blue, from vocalist/pianist Patricia Barber, gained the most notoriety and began an artist/label relationship that has developed along with the label. Ms. Barber's modern cool (1998), which earned a 5-star review from DownBeat Magazine, put Premonition on the map. Since, modern cool's release things are developing faster. The label's roster has tripled over the last several years to include artists from all across the U.S.

Premonition is distributed by Koch Records in the U.S.A. and internationally by Harmonia Mundi in France, UK, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxemborg, In-akustik in Germany, Indigo Records in Spain, Multi Disc in Portugal, IRD in Italy, Multi Kulti Records in Poland, Plainisphare in Switzerland, Hot Records/Didgiredoo in Australia, Shun Cheong Records in Hong Kong, China, Singapore and Thailand, Disk Union in Japan and Distribution Fusion III in Canada.