[78-L] Bell Telephone Stereo

[Michael Biel]

I also have both volumes which were handed to me personally by Arthur 
Keller.  Stupidly I didn't have him autograph them.  There was a second 
pressing of the first volume, and there is an added blue circle on the 
cover of the second pressing.  The second volume has a light blue tint 
to the paper of the cover and is probably rarer than Vol 1.  Thru an 
interpretation of the rules of Bell Telephone's monopoly that they not 
go into the entertainment business, they would not sell the LPs, only 
give them for a donation to the Telephone Pioneers.  There were many 
other masters recorded during the 20s and 30s.  I've seen the first 
volume of the BTL ledgers at the Library of Congress, and saw the 
cabinets of the remaining masters at the Bell Labs back in the 70s.  
They've been moved a couple of times since then.  Unfortunately Keller 
was assigned to weed out the unnecessary ones in the early 70s, and what 
he discarded (for the gold content because they are gold plated) were 
mainly test-tones.  I tried to explain that these could help researchers 
note their progress, but he expressed no interest in that.  The music 
masters were not weeded out for distruction, but when I looked the 1927 
Capitol Theatre dual groove stereo test recordings that are listed in 
the BTL ledger were missing. 

Mike Biel   mbiel at mbiel.com


joe at salerno.com wrote:
> There is a second volume, I have both. There are also a few other clips 
> floating around that were not on either LP.
>
> I have asked before and never got an answer, so I assume that would be a 
> "no", but is there a list of all the known surviving takes?
>
> joe salerno
>
>
> Tom Hood wrote:
>   
>> HI All
>> I have just been loaned a copy of Bell Telephone LP BLT 7901.A fascinating 
>> collection of Bell recordings in "Hi-Fi" from the 1930's in mono & stereo. I 
>> have been told this LP is one of two that were issued in the 1970s of the 
>> 1930 Bell experiments.Can anyone confirm there is a 2nd Volume?
>> Thank You
>> Tom Hood 
>>