[78-L] Advent of Electrical Recording

[Royal Pemberton]

Pre-1925, electric recording had been done experimentally, although Marsh
Laboratories had their own homebrew electrical recording gear they used for
their Autograph records, and for items released on other labels including
Paramount.

I don't know what became of any of Victor's acoustical recording gear.
Different studios converted at different times; I think their last acoustics
were some west coast recordings in the summer of 1925.  After that, all
Victors were electrical recordings.

As has been noted here, Columbia 'went electric' in similar fashion, but
continued using their 1923-upgraded acoustic gear for their budget labels
for some time afterward.  The last known acoustic matrix is 150528-1,
'There's a wah-wah gal in Agua Caliente' by the Golden Gate Orchestra (the
California Ramblers....labels state vocal by Jim Andrews, it's actually
Arthur Fields) recorded 23 May 1930.

Western Electric refused to lease their recording gear to any other labels,
so everyone else (including Edison) had to 'roll their own', cobbling things
together from manufacturers like GE and RCA.

Brunswick began electric recording early in 1925 around the same time as
Victor and Columbia, but with their vastly inferior 'Light-Ray' method
(quickly improved by resorting to a proper microphone).  Pathé and Plaza
(Banner etc) began circa 1926.  Edison began electric recording around
September 1927.

On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 6:34 PM, <fnarf at comcast.net> wrote:

> I have a dumb question that's been bugging me for a while now. Everyone
> knows that electrical recording arrived in 1925. How sudden was the change?
> Did everybody change at once? Did some labels continue to record
> acoustically for some time afterwards? What happened to all the acoustical
> gear -- did they just throw it out, or did they pass it on to some other
> use, perhaps a cheaper auxiliary studio, or a budget label or something?
> What's the last known acoustical recording?
>
>
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