[78-L] Climax record abrupt start

[Michael Biel]

From: David Lennick <dlennick at sympatico.ca>
> Is it possible that they were recording disc and cylinder versions 
> simultaneously, but starting the disc cutters late so that the
> cylinder would be announced and the disc wouldn't?

In several notable cases where there were both disc and cylinder
versions of Columbia recordings compared, all of them were different. 
Additionally, during the "round" era when one performer recorded onto a
bank of multiple cylinder machines, it is said that the announcements
were recorded close-up one-by-one with each machine being started and
stopped separately, and then all machines started simultaneously again
for the recording itself.  They wanted the announcement to be LOUD and
CLEAR.  

I have come across a number of Columbia double-discs from early masters
where it is obvious that the announcement was removed -- sometimes
incompletely.  I've been able to hear occasional words from these.  I
don't think that they "filled in" the grooves on a metal positive as
Mark Chester thought.  I think they sanded, filed off, or otherwise
flattened the ridges on a metal negative.  But there is no way of
knowing for sure which method was used unless we come up with two copies
where it was done differently from each other.

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com