Once Upon Time: a Superficial History of Early Tape
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ARSC Journal
A Discography of the Choral Symphony by J. F. Weber In previous issues of this Journal (XV:2-3; XVI:l-2), an effort was made to compile parts of a composer discography in depth rather than breadth. This one started in a similar vein with the realization that SO CDs of the Beethoven Ninth Symphony had been released (the total is now over 701). This should have been no surprise, for writers have stated that the playing time of the CD was designed to accommodate this work. After eighteen months' effort, a reasonably complete discography of the work has emerged. The wonder is that it took so long to collect a body of information (especially the full names of the vocalists) that had already been published in various places at various times. The Japanese discographers had made a good start, and some of their data would have been difficult to find otherwise, but quite a few corrections and additions have been made and some recording dates have been obtained that seem to have remained 1.Dlpublished so far. The first point to notice is that six versions of the Ninth didn't appear on the expected single CD. Bl:lhm (118) and Solti (96) exceeded the 75 minutes generally assumed (until recently) to be the maximum CD playing time, but Walter (37), Kegel (126), Mehta (127), and Thomas (130) were not so burdened and have been reissued on single CDs since the first CD release. On the other hand, the rather short Leibowitz (76), Toscanini (11), and Busch (25) versions have recently been issued with fillers. -
The Jack Mullin/Bill Palmer Tape Restoration Project*
THETHE JACKJACK MULLIN/BILLMULLIN/BILL PPALMERALMER TTAPEAPE RESTORARESTORATIONTION PROJECPROJECTT** Richard L. Hess Glendale, California, USA hat do you do when you are entrusted him with some of the original to do: rise to the technical and logistical presented with three large German tapes that John T. (Jack) Mullin challenge. Wcartons of flangeless reels of and William A. (Bill) Palmer, a San The tapes arrived in three cardboard 50+-year-old tape? There is no meta- Francisco filmmaker, had used for a cartons that looked quite old. Inside was data,1 no list of contents, no tape speed, variety of purposes right after World an amazing array of packaging. As is no A or B wind information, no EQ War II. often the case in a restoration project, we curves—only tape. Where do you These tapes represent the earliest days had the old recordings and a modern begin? of magnetic recording in the United tape reproducer,3 but no knowledge of I recently found myself in this posi- States, including performances, either the original equipment used to tion. It all started innocently enough. As outtakes, and between-take banter by make the tapes or knowledge of the a member of the AES Los Angeles Bing Crosby, Dinah Shore, Peggy Lee, recording conventions common in the Section Committee, I had undertaken Burl Ives, and Claudette Colbert. late 1940s. Some of the initial chal- the organization of a program at one of Perhaps the gem of this collection is a lenges that presented themselves were: the Section’s monthly meetings. Also as portion of Bing Crosby’s 1947 • The tapes were on AEG (Allgemeine- a member of the AES Technical Christmas Eve show. -
Harold Tichenor 4/3-2016 Dear Fellow Reel to Reel Audiophie
Harold Tichenor 4/3-2016 Dear fellow reel to reel audiophie: I do hope this email gets through to you as I want to let my past reel to reel customers know the new arrangements for acquiring 15 IPS copies of my tape masters. For the last few years I made them principally available through eBay where Deborah Gunn, better known as Reel-Lady, acted as my agent. Both Deb and I were happy with that arrangement and I can’t thank her enough for her valiant efforts to handle all sales professionally and promptly. However, over the past two years changes at eBay have led to prohibitively high listing and closing costs, even to the point that they take a commission on the shipping costs. During the past year there has also been a flood of lower quality tapes coming onto eBay, many made from cd originals or other dubious sources. It just became impossible to produce our high quality tapes at the net return after eBay and Paypal fees were deducted. Deb and I have talked about it quite a lot and looked at alternative ways to make the tapes available. In the end, Deb decided to retire from the master tape sales business. After giving thought to using eBay myself, setting up a website store or engaging another web sales agent, I decided that I would contact you all directly and test the waters on direct sales to my past customers. Thus this email to you directy from me. FIRST: let me say if you would rather not receive these direct emails in future please let me know immediately and I will remove you from the mailing list. -
Ampex Collection Addenda ARS.0109
http://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt4v19s146 No online items Guide to the Ampex Collection Addenda ARS.0109 Finding aid prepared by Franz Kunst Archive of Recorded Sound Braun Music Center 541 Lasuen Mall Stanford University Stanford, California, 94305-3076 650-723-9312 [email protected] © 2011 The Board of Trustees of Stanford University. All rights reserved. Guide to the Ampex Collection ARS.0109 1 Addenda ARS.0109 Descriptive Summary Title: Ampex Collection Addenda Dates: 1944-1998 Collection number: ARS.0109 Repository: Archive of Recorded Sound Collection size: 1 box: 1 folder ; 17 open reel tapes (three 5" reels ; nine 7" reels ; four 10.5" reels ; one 12" reel) Abstract: Various smaller collections related to the Ampex Corporation, the development of magnetic recording on tape, and stereophonic sound. Access Open for research; material must be requested at least two business days in advance of intended use. Contact the Archive for assistance. Publication Rights Property rights reside with repository. Publication and reproduction rights reside with the creators or their heirs. To obtain permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the Head Librarian of the Archive of Recorded Sound. Preferred Citation Ampex Collection Addenda, ARS-0109. Courtesy of the Stanford Archive of Recorded Sound, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, Calif. Sponsor This finding aid was produced with generous financial support from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission. Related Collections Stanford University Special Collections holds the Ampex Corporation Records, M1230. The Archive of Recorded Sound holds the Richard Hess Mullin-Palmer Tape Restoration Project Collection, ARS.0035. Scope and Contents This is a group of small collections, assembled from various donors, related to the history of the Ampex Corporation and its role in the development of sound recording on tape and stereophonic sound. -
A Culture of Recording: Christopher Raeburn and the Decca Record Company
A Culture of Recording: Christopher Raeburn and the Decca Record Company Sally Elizabeth Drew A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The University of Sheffield Faculty of Arts and Humanities Department of Music This work was supported by the Arts & Humanities Research Council September 2018 1 2 Abstract This thesis examines the working culture of the Decca Record Company, and how group interaction and individual agency have made an impact on the production of music recordings. Founded in London in 1929, Decca built a global reputation as a pioneer of sound recording with access to the world’s leading musicians. With its roots in manufacturing and experimental wartime engineering, the company developed a peerless classical music catalogue that showcased technological innovation alongside artistic accomplishment. This investigation focuses specifically on the contribution of the recording producer at Decca in creating this legacy, as can be illustrated by the career of Christopher Raeburn, the company’s most prolific producer and specialist in opera and vocal repertoire. It is the first study to examine Raeburn’s archive, and is supported with unpublished memoirs, private papers and recorded interviews with colleagues, collaborators and artists. Using these sources, the thesis considers the history and functions of the staff producer within Decca’s wider operational structure in parallel with the personal aspirations of the individual in exerting control, choice and authority on the process and product of recording. Having been recruited to Decca by John Culshaw in 1957, Raeburn’s fifty-year career spanned seminal moments of the company’s artistic and commercial lifecycle: from assisting in exploiting the dramatic potential of stereo technology in Culshaw’s Ring during the 1960s to his serving as audio producer for the 1990 The Three Tenors Concert international phenomenon. -
AUDIO GUIDE TOUR 1 48 Wall Street/Murals
Museum of American Finance AUDIO GUIDE TOUR 1 48 Wall Street/Murals The largest object on display at the Museum of American Finance isn’t the bull and bear statue or the statue of Alexander Hamilton. You’re actually standing INSIDE the largest object! In 1797 Alexander Hamilton’s Bank of New York laid the cornerstone for its first building right here at 48 Wall Street. You can see the cornerstone outside where William Street meets Wall Street. Hamilton founded the Bank in 1784 not long after the last of the British troops left American soil for good. The current building is the third Bank of New York headquarters on this site. It opened in 1929 and was active until the Bank acquired the Irving Trust Company and moved into its towering art deco skyscraper at 1 Wall Street in 1988. Like many bank buildings from this era, the architect Benjamin Wistar Morris designed the Grand Mezzanine to convey a sense of strength and power, both in its size and its extensive use of marble and limestone. These materials invoke a sense of security, making the building look like a solid fortress, protecting clients’ money at all costs. Remember, FDIC insurance didn’t come along until 1933. If you look up at the north and east walls of the Grand Mezzanine, you’ll see eight murals painted by J. Monroe Hewlett, an accomplished turn-of-the-century muralist. Alexander Hamilton is front and center in the murals on the north side. These depict scenes from the Bank of New York’s history. -
Stravinsky, Tempo, and Le Sacre Erica Heisler Buxbaum
Performance Practice Review Volume 1 Article 6 Number 1 Spring/Fall Stravinsky, Tempo, and Le Sacre Erica Heisler Buxbaum Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.claremont.edu/ppr Part of the Musicology Commons, Music Performance Commons, and the Music Practice Commons Buxbaum, Erica Heisler (1988) "Stravinsky, Tempo, and Le Sacre," Performance Practice Review: Vol. 1: No. 1, Article 6. DOI: 10.5642/ perfpr.198801.01.6 Available at: http://scholarship.claremont.edu/ppr/vol1/iss1/6 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at Claremont at Scholarship @ Claremont. It has been accepted for inclusion in Performance Practice Review by an authorized administrator of Scholarship @ Claremont. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Stravinsky, Tempo, and Le sacre Erica Heisler Buxbaum Performing the works of Igor Stravinsky precisely as he intended would appear to be an uncomplicated matter: Stravinsky notated his scores in great detail, conducted recorded performances of many of his works, and wrote commentaries that contain a great deal of specific performance information. Stravinsky's recordings and published statements, however, raise as many questions as they answer about the determination of tempo and the documentary value of recordings. Like Wagner, Stravinsky believed that the establishment of the proper tempo for a work was crucial and declared that "a piece of mine can survive almost anything but wrong or uncertain tempo." Stravinsky notated his tempi precisely with both Italian words and metronome markings and asserted on many occasions that the primary value of his recordings was that they demonstrated the proper tempi for his works. -
Jack Lund Collection ARS.0045
http://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/kt5w103784 No online items Guide to the Jack Lund Collection ARS.0045 Finding aid prepared by Frank Ferko Archive of Recorded Sound Braun Music Center 541 Lasuen Mall Stanford University Stanford, California, 94305-3076 650-723-9312 [email protected] © 2011 The Board of Trustees of Stanford University. All rights reserved. Guide to the Jack Lund Collection ARS.0045 1 ARS.0045 Descriptive Summary Title: Jack Lund Collection Dates: 1887-2009 Identifier/Call Number: ARS.0045 Creator: Lund, Jack H. Collection size: 5345 items (570.33 linear ft.)Collection of disc recordings, tapes, books, magazines, programs, librettos, printed music and autographed programs and photographs. Repository: Archive of Recorded Sound, Stanford University Libraries Stanford, California 94305-3076 Abstract: The Jack Lund Collection contains personal papers of Jack Lund as well as numerous newspaper and magazine clippings, photographs, and music books. It also contains Lund's collection of classical music on 78 rpm discs, mostly in albums, 33 1/3 rpm long playing discs, and a small number of open reel tapes. The materials in this collection document the principal musical interests of Mr. Lund, i.e. vocal solo music, opera, careers and performances of specific singers and pianists, and the career of Arturo Toscanini. Since Mr. Lund mantained personal friendships with many musicians he admired, he acquired autographed photographs of these artists, and he regularly corresponded with them. The photographs and many of the letters from these musicians are included in the collection. As an avid reader of published articles and books on musical topics, Mr. -
RCA LHMV 1 His Master's Voice 10 Inch Series
RCA Discography Part 33 - By David Edwards, Mike Callahan, and Patrice Eyries. © 2018 by Mike Callahan RCA LHMV 1 His Master’s Voice 10 Inch Series Another early 1950’s series using the label called “His Master’s Voice” which was the famous Victor trademark of the dog “Nipper” listening to his master’s voice. The label was retired in the mid 50’s. LHMV 1 – Stravinsky The Rite of Spring – Igor Markevitch and the Philharmonia Orchestra [1954] LHMV 2 – Vivaldi Concerto for Oboe and String Orchestra F. VII in F Major/Corelli Concerto grosso Op. 6 No. 4 D Major/Clementi Symphony Op. 18 No. 2 – Renato Zanfini, Renato Fasano and Virtuosi di Roma [195?] LHMV 3 – Violin Concerto for Violin and Orchestra No. 2 (Bartok) – Yehudi Menuhin, Wilhelm Furtwangler and the Philharmonia Orchestra [1954] LHMV 4 – Beethoven Concerto No. 5 in E Flat Op. 73 Emperor – Edwin Fischer, Wilhelm Furtwangler and the Philharmonia Orchestra [1954] LHMV 5 – Brahms Concerto in D Op. 77 – Gioconda de Vito, Rudolf Schwarz and the Philharmonia Orchestra [1954] LHMV 6 - Schone Mullerin Op. 25 The Maid of the Mill (Schubert) – Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Gerald Moore [1/55] LHMV 7 – Elgar Enigma Variations Op. 36 Wand of Youth Suite No. 1 Op. 1a – Sir Adrian Boult and the London Philharmonic Orchestra [1955] LHMV 8 – Bach Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F/Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 in D – Harold Jackson, Gareth Morris, Herbert Sutcliffe, Manoug Panikan, Raymond Clark, Gerraint Jones, Edwin Fischer and the Philharmonia Orchestra [1955] LHMV 9 – Beethoven Symphony No. 5 in C Minor Op. -
A Listening Guide for the Indispensable Composers by Anthony Tommasini
A Listening Guide for The Indispensable Composers by Anthony Tommasini 1 The Indispensable Composers: A Personal Guide Anthony Tommasini A listening guide INTRODUCTION: The Greatness Complex Bach, Mass in B Minor I: Kyrie I begin the book with my recollection of being about thirteen and putting on a recording of Bach’s Mass in B Minor for the first time. I remember being immediately struck by the austere intensity of the opening choral singing of the word “Kyrie.” But I also remember feeling surprised by a melodic/harmonic shift in the opening moments that didn’t do what I thought it would. I guess I was already a musician wanting to know more, to know why the music was the way it was. Here’s the grave, stirring performance of the Kyrie from the 1952 recording I listened to, with Herbert von Karajan conducting the Vienna Philharmonic. Though, as I grew to realize, it’s a very old-school approach to Bach. Herbert von Karajan, conductor; Vienna Philharmonic (12:17) Today I much prefer more vibrant and transparent accounts, like this great performance from Philippe Herreweghe’s 1996 recording with the chorus and orchestra of the Collegium Vocale, which is almost three minutes shorter. Philippe Herreweghe, conductor; Collegium Vocale Gent (9:29) Grieg, “Shepherd Boy” Arthur Rubinstein, piano Album: “Rubinstein Plays Grieg” (3:26) As a child I loved “Rubinstein Plays Grieg,” an album featuring the great pianist Arthur Rubinstein playing piano works by Grieg, including several selections from the composer’s volumes of short, imaginative “Lyrical Pieces.” My favorite was “The Shepherd Boy,” a wistful piece with an intense middle section. -
Visions of Electric Media Electric of Visions
TELEVISUAL CULTURE Roberts Visions of Electric Media Ivy Roberts Visions of Electric Media Television in the Victorian and Machine Ages Visions of Electric Media Televisual Culture Televisual culture encompasses and crosses all aspects of television – past, current and future – from its experiential dimensions to its aesthetic strategies, from its technological developments to its crossmedial extensions. The ‘televisual’ names a condition of transformation that is altering the coordinates through which we understand, theorize, intervene, and challenge contemporary media culture. Shifts in production practices, consumption circuits, technologies of distribution and access, and the aesthetic qualities of televisual texts foreground the dynamic place of television in the contemporary media landscape. They demand that we revisit concepts such as liveness, media event, audiences and broadcasting, but also that we theorize new concepts to meet the rapidly changing conditions of the televisual. The series aims at seriously analyzing both the contemporary specificity of the televisual and the challenges uncovered by new developments in technology and theory in an age in which digitization and convergence are redrawing the boundaries of media. Series editors Sudeep Dasgupta, Joke Hermes, Misha Kavka, Jaap Kooijman, Markus Stauff Visions of Electric Media Television in the Victorian and Machine Ages Ivy Roberts Amsterdam University Press Cover illustration: ‘Professor Goaheadison’s Latest,’ Fun, 3 July 1889, 6. Cover design: Coördesign, Leiden -
Danger Mouse's Grey Album, Mash-Ups, and the Age of Composition
Danger Mouse's Grey Album, Mash-Ups, and the Age of Composition Philip A. Gunderson © 2004 Post-Modern Culture 15.1 Review of: Danger Mouse (Brian Burton), The Grey Album, Bootleg Recording 1. Depending on one's perspective, Danger Mouse's (Brian Burton's) Grey Album represents a highpoint or a nadir in the state of the recording arts in 2004. From the perspective of music fans and critics, Burton's creation--a daring "mash-up" of Jay-Z's The Black Album and the Beatles' eponymous 1969 work (popularly known as The White Album)--shows that, despite the continued corporatization of music, the DIY ethos of 1970s punk remains alive and well, manifesting in sampling and low-budget, "bedroom studio" production values. From the perspective of the recording industry, Danger Mouse's album represents the illegal plundering of some of the most valuable property in the history of pop music (the Beatles' sound recordings), the sacrilegious re-mixing of said recordings with a capella tracks of an African American rapper, and the electronic distribution of the entire album to hundreds of thousands of listeners who appear vexingly oblivious to current copyright law. That there would be a schism between the interests of consumers and the recording industry is hardly surprising; tension and antagonism characterize virtually all forms of exchange in capitalist economies. What is perhaps of note is that these tensions have escalated to the point of the abandonment of the exchange relationship itself. Music fans, fed up with the high prices (and outright price-fixing) of commercially available music, have opted to share music files via peer-to-peer file sharing networks, and record labels are attempting in response to coerce music fans back into the exchange relationship.