[78-L] For 78's, What Does Transcription Mean?

[David Weiner]

When I watched the movie LAURA years ago, I was always impressed by the scene where Laura is listening to her crazed killer-to-be Waldo on the radio, as a reassurance that he isn't stalking her. As the broadcast ends, he suddenly appears at Laura's bedroom door, and we hear the radio announcer intone, "The voice of Waldo Lydecker has been brought to you by electrical transcription."  Shocking!

Dave Weiner

On 4/1/20, 9:14 AM, "Rodger J. Holtin" <78-l-bounces at klickitat.78online.com on behalf of rjh334578 at gmail.com.invalid> wrote:

    
    “Transcription” was used rather euphemistically by the broadcasters for years. The networks viewed anything that was recorded as second-class sound, especially early on. The Hindenburg disaster helped to crack their general outright ban of recordings. 
    
    Small stations, of course, relied heavily on them and on commercial phonograph records. Some artists attempted to thwart that and some labels of the 78 days even said “broadcast prohibited,” to little or no avail. “Electrical Transcriptions” were made just for that purpose and they generally sounded much better than commercial 78s - then and now. 
    
    Somebody else can probably fill in more details here. There was also a time when anything recorded that was played over the air had to be identified as such so listeners would know that it was not live. I have heard taped programs that were identified as “Transcribed in Chicago..” into the 1960s. 
    
    Rodger Holtin