[78-L] Classical 12 inch 78 albums

[Michael Biel]

From: Dan Van Landingham <danvanlandingham at yahoo.com>
> I once owned a Victor 12 inch of the Bach-Gounod arrangement of
> "Ave Maria" with Schubert's "Ave Maria" on the reverse.

This is not an album.  It is just one record.  Albums are books with
several records in pockets.

> As I recall,the orchestra was a Victor studio group called "Victor
> Salon Orchestra" and the conductor on that particular recording date
> was Rosario Bourdon. The particular pressing I had dated from between
> 1938-41 as it was issued on Victor's popular series which was in the 3000s.

It actually was 36029, with the Schubert side by the Victor Concert Orch
and the Back side by Bourdon and the Victor Orch

> This recording had to have dated from somewhere in the mid to late '20s
> as I had a few other Victors that had "Victor Talking Machine Company"
> in the familiar scroll pattern.

That's about right.  I don't have my books handy.

> I am thinking of emailing Bill McLoughlin at WFMT as he once did a programme
> on the Bach transcriptions by Stokowsky on his "Exploring Music" series some
> months ago.I would love to find another copy of it as it was one of my favourite recordings.

It is not that rare.  It was in the catalog into the 1940s.

From: Roger Wade<rwade1947 at comcast.net>
>>> Gee Robert, you're painting with a very broad brush.  What you say
>>> is true for a large majority of such sets, especially post war. 
>>> However many earlier sets are in some demand and sell for more
>>> worthwhile prices.  That has been my experience.  Roger Wade

On 10/8/2010 12:22 AM, Robert M. Bratcher Jr. wrote:
>> Sorry I didn't know that pre war classical sets would sell
>> for more than $2 each. My mistake....

As I started to go thru the catalogs of albums for my pre-Steinweiss
paper (which is now on-line) I realized that the majority of the first
300 albums on both Columbia and Victor are chamber music that I have
never seen.  Until the 1940 price drop, classical albums were very
expensive and a real luxury during the depression.  My impression of the
Royal Blue albums with the silver title stickers was that it was
probably a device they used for inventory control.  They would paste up
albums as they received orders.  I wouldn't be surprised if some of them
sold only between 100 and 200 copies.  

Even rarer are the first classical albums from 1924, the acoustical
ones, and the first electrical classical albums from the un-numbered
Victor sets from 1925-27 and the special automatic sets sold in the
carrier boxes for insertion into the slide-automatic changer carrier.  

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com