[78-L] Making of the EMI centenary Wax recording - some questions

[Royal Pemberton]

1:  Wax.  Looks much like the brown wax used for early cylinders.
1.17--2.13 looks oddly like they were doing tests on lacquer discs.  Why
that would be done, I don't know, as lacquer requires a different type of
stylus from wax, so if they used a stylus suited for wax cutting on lacquer
discs, the results wouldn't be too useful.  And I'd think the harder
composition of lacquer would cause a recording made on it (even with the
appropriate type of cutting stylus) to sound very different to what is
obtained on wax.

2:  Outside start cutting.

3:  It looks like that is the crank to make spirals, be they lead-in or
lead-out.  The machine looks like the wind-up lathes in use by the 1930s at
Abbey Road, so much better than what was being actually used in the early
part of the acoustic recording era.

4:  I don't know.  I've never seen a copy of the record, and as far as I
know, only vinyl pressings were made, not shellac, so there's no way it
could have been safely and successfully played on most any vintage acoustic
player.  The last segment sounds like they tried to make the final record
sound a little scratchier than it really is.

On Mon, Aug 23, 2010 at 1:38 AM, Milan Milovanovic <
milanpmilovanovic4 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello members,
>
> two days ago I watched this clip:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zbHBxjFxBbo
>
>
> After carefully watching it some questions raised, so I would like to ask
> if anybody knows:
>
> 1) Is this, in fact, making of acetate disc recording, or I'm missing
> something here? It is clearly shown acetate/nitrate/lacquer disc as
> recording media, not wax discs. These are shown earlier in the clip, but I
> haven't seen them later during the final stages of making the recording.
>
> 2) (slider position 0:31) Is it really inside start disc? What can be seen
> here on turntable - is it vinyl translucent pressing or
> acetate/celluloid/vinyl foil? No lead-out groove? Is it some other
> recording?
>
> 3) (slider position 1:45 - 1:50) Are they making lead-out groove with
> locked groove after?
>
> 4) (slider position from 2:23 - 5:02) Some strange noises occurred. Is this
> reproduction of acetate master through acoustical player?
>
>
>
> Thank you,
>
> Milan
> _______________________________________________
> 78-L mailing list
> 78-L at klickitat.78online.com
> http://klickitat.78online.com/mailman/listinfo/78-l
>