[78-L] Columbia classics

[David Lennick]

Yeah, Victor had a very distinctive "sound" around 1946. The odd thing is that 
they made players that compensated for it. I heard a 1946 vintage table model 
player and "Managua, Nicaragua" was played on it, and the damn thing sounded great.

Nothing's as horrible as Victor's first post-ban Red Seals, like the Boston 
Pops "Salute to Our Fighting Forces" and the "Oklahoma" album, all full of wow 
and distortion and more wow. I think they were going through 3 stages of dubs 
for a while (Ted Hering confirms as much in his discographical notes to Jack 
Myrtle's Spike Jones Bio-Discography).

dl

Royal Pemberton wrote:
> I've not heard many classicals by either Columbia or Victor, but of what few
> I've heard the worst sound I've found was on some 1940s Victors, where they
> went OTT with limiters and as a result, massed ensemble passages are a
> congested mess.
> 
> On Thu, Jan 28, 2010 at 3:15 AM, David Lennick <dlennick at sympatico.ca>wrote:
> 
>> Michael Biel wrote:
>>> From: samhopper at mail.com
>>>> I totally disagree with your comments re: Columbia orchestra recordings.
>>>> After writing 250 pages of my pet project - the Columbia Masterworks 78
>>>> rpm discography and having listened to hundreds of Col. recordings -
>>>> I can say that there are countless excellent electrical recordings
>>>> released by Columbia of US orchestras!
>> http://masterworks.gramophile.com/
>>> And that discography is coming along great.  I will be providing
>>> additional info and photos in a little while.  I have 4 or 5 of the
>>> first dozen of the acoustical albums.  And yesterday I finally got a
>>> chance to see and photograph the Kosty-Godfrey Peter and the Wolf MM
>>> 1034.  Didn't get to listen to them to compare with the LPs.  I think
>>> these past two weeks I have solidified my worldwide reputation as that
>>> guy who comes to sound archives to look at the records instead of
>>> listening to them.
>>>
>>> From: DAVID BURNHAM <burnhamd at rogers.com>
>>>>> When Sony issued the Mitropolous recording of Mahler's 1st Symphony
>>>>> and some Bruno Walter recordings by NYPO, they proved there was a
>>>>> lot more quality tucked away in the master grooves than was ever
>>>>> evident on the issued 78s.
>>> I think these were reprocessed by Seth Winner, and he gave an ARSC
>>> presentation about these.  Considering playback equipment in the 40s was
>>> not anything at all like we now have, it is obvious that the dubbed 78s
>>> can not compare.  It has been my experience that the sound quality of
>>> different transfers to the 78s can sound vastly different.  I noticed
>>> that many decades ago when comparing two copies of one of the Rathbone
>>> dramas, and this has led me to check every alternate copy I've come
>>> across to see if the numbers are different.
>>>
>>> Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com
>>>
>> I believe the Mahler 1 was transferred from lacquers that had not
>> previously
>> been used as source material. Dave Burnham is correct that many Columbia
>> orchestral recordings are bloody awful in their 78 incarnations. My
>> experience
>> is that the earliest ones, in late 1939, may have been direct 78 cuts with
>> 33RPM safeties being made simultaneously but that they switched to 33rpm
>> originals as sources not long after, necessitating dubs. Rodzinski's
>> "Scheherazade" and Tchaikovsky 5th sound fabulous on early 78 pressings.
>> Columbia's recordings of the Minneapolis Symphony from the same period are
>> shrill and unlistenable. The Mahler 1 on 78s has a climax that sounds like
>> a
>> car crash and for some reason, later pressings were never made from new
>> transfers but from the original 1941 dubs. I've never listened to "Karma".
>> Their late 20s recordings of Damrosch and the New York Symphony are no
>> great
>> hell either but no worse than Brunswicks, and Victor made some pretty bad
>> orchestral recordings in those days as well, like the Detroit Symphony
>> records
>> under Gabrilowitsch where they used a portable cutter that fluttered when
>> large
>> waxes were placed on it.
>>
>> Columbia also had some pretty mediocre playback equipment in the early 40s,
>> and
>> there's a Music & Arts CD that has a photo of Leopold Stokowski listening
>> to
>> one of his playbacks and probably re-equalizing the living daylights out of
>> it.
>> Wonder if it was Cowell's "Tales of Our Countryside"?
>>
>> dl
>>
>> _______________________