[78-L] unstable records, was CV records

[David Lennick]

There's a Paderewski electrical that is a major economy sized pain to keep on 
pitch. Two-sided piece..as I recall, I had to do a pitch adjustment of close to 
5 percent in the first few seconds.

There are also some two-part recordings where the pitch is entirely different 
between the two sides. One is Respighi's "Aria di Corte" on Victor (Barbirolli, 
New York Philharmonic). Another is Hovhaness' "Mihr" on Disc..that one drove me 
crazy 30 years ago when I had no frame of reference or proper key-checking 
equipment and couldn't tell which side was in the correct key, if any.

dl

joe at salerno.com wrote:
> Speed instability is not limited to minor labels or very early records. 
> We could probably start a new thread of unstable 78s.
> 
> Rachmaninoff's "One Lives but Once" (Strauss) 78 is horrible for speed 
> stability IIRC. There's one early piano recording on Gramophone (it's on 
> APR but I'm too lazy to go look it up) where the artist starts playing 
> before the platter is rotating up to speed. These were careless things, 
> or machine malfunctions. It's more surprising that they allowed such a 
> thing to be released, but in a new industry, who cares? CV records were 
> an attempt to bring new technology to the market. I don't know if they 
> played longer, but the sound quality would be more consistent through 
> out the record, and I assume, surface noise as well.
> 
> joe salerno
> 
> 
> yves francois wrote:
>>   ...so a CV record is doing the opposite on purpose what the Gennett 6089 did by accident, probably due to faulty mechanisms, very interesting, guess my obsession with jazz does not take me to certain avenues of 78's
>> thanks, I think I got it now
>> Yves
>>
>>
>> --- On Sat, 3/21/09, Royal Pemberton <ampex354 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> From: Royal Pemberton <ampex354 at gmail.com>
>> No.  A CV record (assuming an outside-start cut) played
>>> back on a
>>> regular turntable will either start out at a very high
>>> pitch, much
>>> faster than normal, gradually seeming to slow down toward
>>> normalcy
>>> toward the end, or if started at a speed where things sound
>>> normal, it
>>> will gradually sound slower and slower, as if things are
>>> running down.
>>> ____________________
>>
>>> Subject: Re: [78-L] constant velocity records, was Value of 78's
>>> To: "78-L Mail List" <78-l at klickitat.78online.com>
>>> Date: Saturday, March 21, 2009, 2:07 PM
>>> On 3/21/09, yves francois <aprestitine at yahoo.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>>    ... are we aware of one of the very rare records
>>> Gennett 6089 (Vicksburg
>>>> Blowers, reissued on Herw> in LP 109, Joe Bussard let
>>> the Herwin record label
>>>> use his disc for the LP reissue, I of course, never
>>> seen this 78), it plays
>>>> progressively faster on the last minute or so of the
>>> record, is this similar
>>>> to the concept you are talking about (though it sounds
>>> like an error in the
>>>> machinery on that record, both sides)? Too bad it is
>>> not corrected, it is a
>>>> reasonable performance (though not as good as the King
>>> Brady's Clarinet Band
>>>> on Black Patti of similar heritage)
>>>> Yves Francois