[78-L] Pearl CD bronzing on "Music From The New York

[Sammy Jones]

Interesting that your bronzed discs were part of the Music from the New York 
Stage set.  The same thing happened to some of the discs in Volume 4 of that 
set to me.  Interestingly, Vols. 1 - 3 haven't so far exhibited this 
problem, but I bought them several years after I bought Volume 4.  It's 
highly annoying because those sets were very expensive even when new, and 
now can be hard to find, with Volume 4 apparently being the rarest.

As far as remedies go, sometimes ripping  in Windows Media Player (at full 
44.1 .wav resolution) will get a good copy where other methods have failed. 
That being said, my discs were ultimately not recoverable, and a kind 78-L 
listmember sent me CDR copies of Volume 4.

Let us know if you're able to get a decent copy made!

Sammy Jones

Dennis Forkel wrote:
> Well, it's finally happened to me. Sometime in the last ten years I've 
> read on this list as well as the RMCR Google group about the legendary 
> "bronzing syndrome". The past few weeks I've been ordering Lps & CDs from 
> Amazon of items I couldn't afford when they were new. Lots of Gielgud, 
> Dame Judith Anderson, various vintage music, etc. I test them out when I 
> get them, scanning tracks. Today the 3-CD set of "Music From The New York 
> Stage-volume one:1890-1908"  arrived. Imagine my surprise when I opened 
> the bubble package & CD case to see these beautifully colored bronze Pearl 
> CDs. The color is quite nice, & gives an antiqued look as the rim edges 
> are a darker bronze than the main body of the CD. As I stared at the CDs 
> it dawned on me that I had some CDs with "the bronzing syndrome" right in 
> front of my four eyes! So I placed the first CD into a portable Sony 
> boombox player & hit "PLAY". No problem with the first track. Advancing 
> tracks I found that the last track, #32, has an i
> ntermittent "static noise" that comes & goes. So much for May Irwin's 
> "When You Ain't Got No Money, You Needn't Come Around" from 1907. I plan 
> to get Archeophone's reissue of May Irwin's recordings, so I'm not too 
> grief-stricken as yet. And I have two or three of the Victor 78s(including 
> "The Bully Song", which contains the "N-word" 8 times in 3:28 minutes!).
>
> I will do some searches of course, but I thought first I'd toss this out 
> there & ask the 78-L family what solutions(if any) there might be for 
> extracting the maximum tracks from these flawed CDs. I will try playing 
> them in computer drives, DVD players, LD players & see which lasers can 
> read the most number of damaged tracks. So far I haven't gotten to discs 
> two & three. I suppose then I should burn them to new CD-R media ASAP. Any 
> tips are appreciated. Oddly, last week I got "Music From The New York 
> Stage-volume four:1917-1920" , & those discs play fine all the way 
> through. They are the normal shiny silver hue. Both Pearl sets say made in 
> UK by PDO & both have a 1993 copyright year on them. I also remember the 
> RCA/BMG Caruso set with the colored batwing CDs that deteriorated & became 
> unreadable. My set from 1995 has the usual silver discs.
>
> The digital compact disc, "Perfect sound forever". Pressed or burned, it 
> doesn't seem to be a guarantee of permanence at all. Since 2003 I've 
> bought CD-R issues from James Lockwood's "78s2CD", Glenn Sage's "Tinfoil", 
> & several sets from First Generation Radio Archives. The Radio Archives 
> sets used a mix of CD-Rs, all cheapies with brands such as Circuit City, 
> Office Max, etc. All were computer burned CD-Rs & several discs from each 
> of these vendors have tracks that are static-ridden, skip, or are just 
> plain unreadable. Chris Clawson's "Meloware" CD-Rs have held up fine. They 
> are all TDK. I've always had a policy of not burning my own CD-Rs of 
> titles I've bought, & have actually gone back to a vendor to buy 
> additional copies if I want to gift them to someone. But no more. In 2000 
> I bought a Pioneer PDR-W739 CD recorder, which functions perfectly to this 
> day(knock wood). It came with a 10-pack of TDK music-type CD-Rs, & I 
> bought another 10-pack of Memorex branded ones at the sa
> me time. All of them still play today, including the much maligned Memorex 
> discs.
>
> I got into CDs relatively late, in 1994. I was fascinated by the 
> technology & couldn't wait to get my hands on a CD audio recorder as soon 
> as the prices dropped to a reasonable "component" level. Now I have 
> three(the other two are Sonys). But with CDs & CD-Rs that fail, downloads 
> of unsatisfying bit rates, memory sticks & hard drives that also fail I'm 
> sure glad I've got a few thousand actual 78s & eight Victrolas/Grafonolas 
> to play them on. Now to grab a handful of steel needles & head towards the 
> Credenza!
>
> Dennis "Shellac-a-phobia" Forkel
>
>
>