[78-L] Alternate takes?

[Milan P Milovanovic]

Alternate takes?

Dear members,

listening to jazz music a lot, I always wonder how alternate takes or breakdown takes survived till nowadays. OK, it is clear to me that after 1939 or so they used 16" lacquers for master recording machine (and later on they transfer successful takes to 10" discs).

But, how about before that? Why on earth will anyone keep, electroplate and press non finished fragments - I think that it wasn't so cheap to do such processing? Also, was main purpose of getting alternate takes possibility to get another set of mother/father/stampers, or these were only to producer choice what to put on final finished record? I know about that Armstrong case where both takes were issued on various labels - but is it exception or there were some more examples of such procedure?

Thanks in advance,

Milan