New BMG/RCA Toscanini Beethoven Edition - MY Take On It.
Curtis Croulet
Diego-area stores. The covers are attractive, but since I have the complete
"Toscanini Collection" as well as many of the LP issues (in sound ranging
from excellent to hilariously bad), there'd have to be some really
significant improvement to make me buy these yet again.
Matthew B. Tepper
NoE...@AnyOldPlace.Arg pondered what I'm pondering as follows:
>
>Contrary to the observations so far here in the n. g., as well as
>previous comments made by some recipients of Japanese editions
>ostensibly made by 20-bit processing of the Toscanini "masters" (or so
>they are claimed) I have so far found that the new BMG edition of the
>familiar set of the Beethoven symphonies to be in FALSIFIED, FAKED
>SOUND!
Ah, memories of the late, great B.H. Haggin come rolling back, just
from your use of what must have been his favorite word: "falsified"!
>If RCA & BMG are going to go back to their bad old ways, then I can
>only recommend that Toscanini enthusiasts give up on the "authorized"
>recordings in favor of the excellent Naxos Toscanini Concert Edition".
Amen to that. Thank you for your take, even if it had to be such bad
news.
--
Matthew B. Tepper: WWW, science fiction, classical music, ducks!
My personal home page -- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/index.htm
My main music page --- http://www.deltanet.com/~ducky/berlioz.htm
And my science fiction club's home page --- http://www.lasfs.org/
To write to me, do for my address what Androcles did for the lion
A. F. T.
previous comments made by some recipients of Japanese editions
ostensibly made by 20-bit processing of the Toscanini "masters" (or so
they are claimed) I have so far found that the new BMG edition of the
familiar set of the Beethoven symphonies to be in FALSIFIED, FAKED
SOUND!
We really need to dig up B. H. Haggin from his resting place, for only
HE could do justice, in vituperation and indignation, to the INJUSTICE
being done to Toscanini. Now, one perceives that the excellent,
honest Gold Seal edition was but a momentary aberration in the
terrible history of RCA mucking things up: making good master
recordings, but bringing only ruined, fiddled-with, butchered,
reprocessed, and altered sonics to the consumer.
One must also note that RCA has seen fit to fall back into their old
vulgar ways of hyping and over-promoting the Toscanini recordings, as
if at this late date the Maestro and his interpretations have to be
"sold" to a gullible or indifferent public. Well, the customers for
Toscanini's records continue to be dedicated music lovers and experts
who can appreciate the skill lavished on the interpretations by
conductor, soloists, and orchestra members alike. We do NOT need to
have some idiotic press agent, copy writer, or producer shove down our
throats more bathetic crap about the "immortal legacy" or the
"uncompromising genius" of Toscanini...the recordings and performances
can speak for themselves, and need to have a more respectful and
circumspect treatment than the purple prose that should be saved for
the likes of Boccelli or Lanza.
We are informed in the pretentious statements in the booklets for this
new edition that now, the sonics are closest to the sound heard by
Toscanini himself when he audited these original recordings. Well,
fellahs at RCA, I have news for you: when Toscanini heard these
masters at the 24th Street Recording Studio, or at Riverdale on the
fine hi-fi that Walter Toscanini had constructed (with speakers all
around the listening room and a suped-up amplification system for
realistic volume levels) there was NONE of the added phony stereo echo
and strange parametric equalization that burdens these shoddy, false,
and low-fi fake stereo transfers.
Are you, RCA/BMG guys, actually attempting to LIE to us and to DENY
that you have added STEREO ECHO that is NOT in the original tape or
disk masters? If so, then you are underestimating the intelligence of
today's record collectors and auditors. If you are insisting that
this is an AUTHENTIC, realistic, and honest transfer, then WHY is
there heavy L-R ambience in the set? Why have the highs been so
squizzily boosted with hi-Q curves that cause painful shrillness and
emphasize the tape hiss? WHY has the bass been so over-boosted? The
combination of bass boost and heavy phony stereo echo completely
falsifies the clarity of the lower registers of the ensemble.
Toscanini did NOT hear the recordings this way: VERGOGNA!
The Beethoven Ninth is a TRAVESTY. There is so much echo that the
performance actually suffers and seems distant and muddy. It loses
impact and tightness. The highs are strange: pinched, wiry, colored.
By contrast, the Gold Seal edition is sweet-toned, lithe, and clear,
with stunning impact and transparency.
The claims of "20-bit resolution" are specious, of course, as any CD
made to current standards has to be re-mapped down to 16-bits. Who
are you kidding? Perhaps a 20-bit sample with UV-22 noise shaping
MIGHT make a slight improvement of a very wide dynamic range
recording, but the original masters of these performances seldom vary
more than 35 to 38 dB from the very tiniest, faintest detail to the
loudest passage. And the masters and probably NOT being used; surely
if they were, the transfers would be QUIETER than the Gold Seal
edition, which -- as admitted by John Pfeiffer -- was done from 15 ips
open-reel edited copies given to Walter Toscanini for the Maestro's
approval.
The hiss in the Beethoven Ninth, as accentuated by the grotesque
re-equalization, become so irritating that one can scarcely listen all
the way through. Even the old Red Seal LP edition was better; as was
the rather thin-sounding Victrola set.
RUN, do not walk, to your record dealer and snatch up the Gold Seal
before it disappears, if you value accuracy of reproduction. Whatever
spurious "richness" is claimed for this new set, you may achieve by
making slight corrections with a very simple graphic equalizer or tone
control system: and do it BETTER than the producers have achieved for
this monstrosity.
If this is what one may expect of the later releases, then I can only
cry in pain, anguish, and frustration: the Philistines are at it
again!
WHY can't we have some competent producer (like, for example, a Seth
Winner) take over this project?
If RCA & BMG are going to go back to their bad old ways, then I can
only recommend that Toscanini enthusiasts give up on the "authorized"
recordings in favor of the excellent Naxos Toscanini Concert Edition".
This pains me to write, as I had thought that by now the record
companies had begun to mend their ways and bring us purist transfers
that preserved the qualities of the originals, without adding phony
artifacts. I am sad for Walfredo Toscanini, who "signs" the statement
in the programming booklet: if he really believes the phony claims
made by RCA, he is credulous and is NO audiophile.
I would like the Toscanini heirs to continue to enjoy a fine income
from the legacy of the great conductor: but I would prefer that the
money be earned honestly, from recorded transfers that are made with
the fidelity and accuracy that the Maestro himself struggled to
achieve.
A FANATICAL TOSCANINIPHILE
"Ignorance is bliss: use a killfile & add to it every day!"
-- Corno di Bassetto
Simon Roberts
: Contrary to the observations so far here in the n. g., as well as
: previous comments made by some recipients of Japanese editions
: ostensibly made by 20-bit processing of the Toscanini "masters" (or so
: they are claimed) I have so far found that the new BMG edition of the
: familiar set of the Beethoven symphonies to be in FALSIFIED, FAKED
: SOUND!
Contrary to what you suggest above, several people on this ng have already
complained about the "faked sound" as well as a host of elementary howlers
in the booklets (performances misidentified, inaccurate timings, etc.).
Simon
Rtsina
>We really need to dig up B. H. Haggin from his resting place, for only
>HE could do justice, in vituperation and indignation, to the INJUSTICE
>being done to Toscanini. Now, one perceives that the excellent,
>honest Gold Seal edition was but a momentary aberration in the
>terrible history of RCA mucking things up: making good master
>recordings, but bringing only ruined, fiddled-with, butchered,
>reprocessed, and altered sonics to the consumer.
>
And I'll bet old B.H. would call these RCA bozos "a bunch of shady dogs."
Cheers
DT
Lawrence G. Kasimow
parts of it are presently available at Tower Records in Los Angeles (Sunset
- anywhere else?) on sale at $4.99 a disk. I certainly have no affiliation
with Tower.
Lawrence Kasimow
Matthew B. Tepper <ducky兀deltanet.com> wrote in article
<7482lo$r...@chronicle.concentric.net>...
> In article <366d48b8...@newsreader.2xtreme.net>,
> NoE...@AnyOldPlace.Arg pondered what I'm pondering as follows:
> >
> >Contrary to the observations so far here in the n. g., as well as
> >previous comments made by some recipients of Japanese editions
> >ostensibly made by 20-bit processing of the Toscanini "masters" (or so
> >they are claimed) I have so far found that the new BMG edition of the
> >familiar set of the Beethoven symphonies to be in FALSIFIED, FAKED
> >SOUND!
>
> Ah, memories of the late, great B.H. Haggin come rolling back, just
> from your use of what must have been his favorite word: "falsified"!
>
> >If RCA & BMG are going to go back to their bad old ways, then I can
> >only recommend that Toscanini enthusiasts give up on the "authorized"
> >recordings in favor of the excellent Naxos Toscanini Concert Edition".
>
mike gray
Hear, hear!
The genesis of this project was BMG Europe, BTW, not BMG USA.
Now, let's get back to Art Fierro's *authentic* sound of the Maestro.
But better hurry - the earlier transfers are scheduled for deletion.
Mike Gray
David R L Porter
from NoE...@AnyOldPlace.Arg (A. F. T.) contains these words:
> RUN, do not walk, to your record dealer and snatch up the Gold Seal
> before it disappears, if you value accuracy of reproduction.
I'm glad to hear this -- I know nothing of the relative merits of
different Toscanini recordings, having had no chance to put different
transfers of the same original side by side (most of my Toscanini is
on LP and there isn't a lot of it, though I do enjoy his work very
much). But a few days ago, remembering the discussions here in rmcr,
I bought the Gold Seal Toscanini sampler CDin a second-hand store and
was very impressed with the sound. In particular, the vibrancy and
attack of the Academic Festival Overture string playing as recorded
made me sit up and take notice, and what may be a very well-judged
amount of added reverb that allows the notes to die away with just
the right decay factor -- IMO -- it may be on the original for all I
know; in any case this is a less dry recording than I usually hear
with Toscanini.
I shall be following your advice and my ears and will be buying some
of the discs from this set as an early Christmas present to myself.
Re other historical 'improved' transfers of various material, I can't
tell you how often I have been delighted that my Quad amplifier
allows me to switch both stereo channels into one mono channel.
--
Best wishes,
David.
david....@zetnet.co.uk
+ + + + + + + + + + + + +
O flute that throbs with the thanksgiving breath
Of convalescents on the shores of death.
O bless the freedom that you never chose ...
O wear your tribulation like a rose.
(W. H. Auden, 'Anthem for St Cecilia's Day')
Matthew B. Tepper
>
>least parts of it are presently available at Tower Records in Los
>Angeles (Sunset - anywhere else?) on sale at $4.99 a disk. I
>certainly have no affiliation with Tower.
>
>Lawrence Kasimow
And after I've ordered large numbers of them from overseas at between
$7-$8 a disc ... AIEEEE!
Don Drewecki
AFT:
You are to be commended! I now have some more money to spend on BBC
Radio 3 dubs, and will not patronize stupidity and laziness on BMG's
part.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Don Drewecki
Mike:
Does this mean the Toscanini videos are also scheduled for deletion???
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Bob Harper
great conductor whose performances should be represented in any
self-respecting collection.
I happened to be in a Tower store in Portland (OR) today, and heard the
newly reissued recording of the Beethoven 2nd Symphony. It didn't talke
long to hear what AFT is lamenting. Boomy, headache inducing bass and
lots of artificial reverb. Horrible!
This being the case, I'd appreciate it if Matthew, AFT, or someone else
would post a list of the "Essential Toscanini" both as to performance
and transfer. I note that the RCA Gold Seals are still extant, although
it seems they are to be deleted. Might as well grab what's best while
it's still out there.
Thanks.
Bob Harper
mike gray
Don't know for certain, but it wouldn't surprise me ...
MG
Curtis Croulet
They aren't already? I have the laserdiscs. Folks interested in purchasing
that format may want to investigate Ken Crane's Laserdiscs. They had all of
the AT laserdiscs last time I was there, in May.
Matthew B. Tepper
Seth.B...@worldnet.att.net pondered what I'm pondering as follows:
>
>Thank you, A.F.T., but don't forget about Art Fierro.....Seth B.
Winner
Or your comrade Adrian Cosentini (whose sister Cecilia I happened to
see in Burbank last Saturday).
Seth Winner
Thanks for your approval of the sound of the Academic Festival Overture
transfer which I did for Art Fierro and Bill lacey for that sampler...It was
the first transfer that I did under the permission of RHA/NYPL back in 1989
to produce transfers for the TOSCANINI COLLECTION. Apparently, Mr. Mortimer
Frank in the Winter ICRC felt that this transfer was excessively
shrill!!!!!...just to let you know, the original source was a set of RCA 16"
lacquers recorded off the line by that same company at their 24th Street
studios. The "reverb" you hear is the microphone placement done by Charles
Grey, who placed the mikes further away from the orchestra than his
predecessor, Bob Johnston. As I am writing this e-mail, I am dumping the
CD-R master for my presentation at Cooper Union of the complete concert of
April 5, 1941 restored, and re-pitched properly from the original surviving
sets of NBC lacquers.....Seth B. Winner
David R L Porter wrote in message <199812041...@zetnet.co.uk>...
>The message <366d48b8...@newsreader.2xtreme.net>
> from NoE...@AnyOldPlace.Arg (A. F. T.) contains these words:
>
>> RUN, do not walk, to your record dealer and snatch up the Gold Seal
>> before it disappears, if you value accuracy of reproduction.
>
Seth Winner
Seth Winner wrote in message ...
Seth Winner
alhe...@my-dejanews.com
You can actually get the entire Gold Seal Toscanini Collection (82 CDs) from
Berkshire now, at an average of somewhere between $5 and $6 a disk. Not every
last one of them would make my essential list, but those that are on it,
bought at the more normal $11-$12 per disk range, would be more costly than
getting the whole set from Berkshire.
--
August Helmbright
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
John Wilson
wrote:
>
>This being the case, I'd appreciate it if Matthew, AFT, or someone else
>would post a list of the "Essential Toscanini" both as to performance
>and transfer. I note that the RCA Gold Seals are still extant, although
>it seems they are to be deleted. Might as well grab what's best while
>it's still out there.
>
This would be my short list of Essential Toscanini:
(All from the Gold Seal Toscanini Collection)
Beethoven Symphonies Vol. 1-5
Brahms Symphonies, Overtures & Haydn Variations Vol. 6-9
Mendelssohn Symphonies 4 & 5 Vol. 17
Beethoven Symphonies 3 & 8 (1939) Vol. 23
Beethoven Symphony 3 (1953) & Mozart Symphony 40 Vol. 29
Berlioz Romeo et Juliette Vol. 34
Mussorgsky Pictures, Elgar Enigma Vol. 35
Ravel Daphnis et Chloe: Suite #2 Vol. 39
Debussy Le Mer, Iberia Vol. 37
Tchaikovsky PC #1 (1943) Horowitz Vol. 44
Beethoven Overtures Vol. 45
Rossini Overtures Vol. 47
Gluck Orfer ed Euridice Act 2 Vol. 46
Wagner Preludes & Excerpts Vol. 48
Wagner Preludes & Excerpts Vol. 49
Wagner Walkure Act 1, Scene 3 (Traubel & Melchior) Vol. 52
Wagner Siegfried & Gotterdammerung excerpts (Traubel) Vol. 53
Beethoven Fidelio (complete) Vol. 54
Puccini La Boheme (complete) Vol. 55
Verdi Falstaff (complete) Vol. 57
Verdi Otello (complete) Vol. 58
Beethoven Missa Solemnis Vol. 61
Verdi Rigoletto Act 4 Vol. 62
The New York Philharmonic recordings Vol. 64-66
The Philadelphis Orchestra recordings Vol. 67-70
I guess it's not very short but never the less these are recordings I
would consider essential and not want to be without. I've probably
forgotten some and I'm sure others would have different choices. I
have confined the list to the RCA "Collection" however there are a
number of other Toscanini performances I would not want to be without
on other labels but that's another thread.
John
Toscanini Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~jw3/index.html
Simon Roberts
: I guess it's not very short but never the less these are recordings I
: would consider essential and not want to be without. I've probably
: forgotten some and I'm sure others would have different choices.
Not very different; but I wouldn't want to be without the Verdi Requiem.
Simon
Ethan Prater
>If it's of interest to anyone. The Naxos Toscanini edition or at least
>parts of it are presently available at Tower Records in Los Angeles (Sunset
>- anywhere else?) on sale at $4.99 a disk. I certainly have no affiliation
>with Tower.
A large selection of these are also available at New York City's Tower
Records on 4th St, priced at $8.99 per disc.
Has any published printed review analyzed the pitching of this Naxos
edition? If it has been done to same abysmal standards of their Metropolitan
Opera issues (*not* available at Tower NYC), then they're hardly worth
picking up even at five bucks a disc.
-Ethan
--
Ethan Evan Prater
pra...@interport.net
Matthew B. Tepper
>
>least parts of it are presently available at Tower Records in Los
>Angeles (Sunset - anywhere else?) on sale at $4.99 a disk. I
>certainly have no affiliation with Tower.
>
I just returned from that store myself, and can confirm that it looks
like the first two sets of Toscanini releases are there _in toto_,
alone with many of the historical operas (no _Tristan_, though, nor the
new _Traviata_ nor _Merry Mount_, the latter of which is on its way to
me already courtesy of MDT). They are stickered as "Special Imports,"
but are priced pretty much the same as regular Naxos releases, but are
on *sale* at least for a few days. I picked up _Pelléas et Mélisande_
(Singher, Sayao, Kipnis, Tibbett!) for $11.99 + tax.
I guess the dead hand of Wanda, and the living but flaccid one of Dopey
Volpe, cannot reach three thousand miles to restrain trade here in Los
Angeles. Nyah, nyah, nyah. Buy fast before their lawyers wake up!
Some of the new Naxos series of American music are on an endcap, too.
John Wilson
Roberts) wrote:
Neither would I and how could I have forgotten it. Thanks Simon.
John
dirk...@ms14.hinet.net
> would consider essential and not want to be without. I've probably
> have confined the list to the RCA "Collection" however there are a
> number of other Toscanini performances I would not want to be without
> on other labels but that's another thread.
>
> John
> Toscanini Web Page: http://home.earthlink.net/~jw3/index.html
I'll just add one off the top of my head (and probably to Simon's chagrin,
since he doesn't agree about its merits): the 1951 live Strauss' Death and
Transfiguration. For a Toscanini performance (or compared to anyone else's
performance of this work, for that matter), it contains great extremes of
tempo variation and expressive gesture. Yet it still has the tightly knit
continuity that we expect from Toscanini. A marvelous performance, clearly
recorded, but suffering somewhat from the same lack of "bloom" and fullness
as many from the same source.
--Bill Dirks
Marc Perman
>In article <01be1f6b$20466a80$6fe26180@default>, lkas...@hup.ucla.edu
>pondered what I'm pondering as follows:
>>
>>If it's of interest to anyone. The Naxos Toscanini edition or at
>>least parts of it are presently available at Tower Records in Los
>>Angeles (Sunset - anywhere else?) on sale at $4.99 a disk. I
>>certainly have no affiliation with Tower.
>>
>>Lawrence Kasimow
>
>I just returned from that store myself, and can confirm that it looks
>like the first two sets of Toscanini releases are there _in toto_,
>alone with many of the historical operas (no _Tristan_, though, nor the
>new _Traviata_ nor _Merry Mount_, the latter of which is on its way to
>me already courtesy of MDT). They are stickered as "Special Imports,"
>but are priced pretty much the same as regular Naxos releases, but are
>on *sale* at least for a few days. I picked up _Pelléas et Mélisande_
>(Singher, Sayao, Kipnis, Tibbett!) for $11.99 + tax.
>
>I guess the dead hand of Wanda, and the living but flaccid one of Dopey
>Volpe, cannot reach three thousand miles to restrain trade here in Los
>Angeles. Nyah, nyah, nyah. Buy fast before their lawyers wake up!
>
>Some of the new Naxos series of American music are on an endcap, too.
>
I saw the Naxos Toscaninis at 4th and Broadway today for $8.99 per
disc, and I was tempted to have them call Sunset Blvd. for a price
check, but was afraid that the result would have been to raise the LA
price rather than lower NY. So enjoy your "Nyahs." I did manage to
extract the Sibelius Tosc. disc from A&B Sound for around $4 US.
Nyah?
Marc Perman
Simon Roberts
dirk...@ms14.hinet.net wrote:
: I'll just add one off the top of my head (and probably to Simon's chagrin,
: since he doesn't agree about its merits): the 1951 live Strauss' Death and
: Transfiguration.
Not at all; I merely don't think it's the best ever, which I think you do;
I slightly prefer Kempe, that's all....
Simon
Tony Movshon
per...@mindspring.com (Marc Perman) writes:
> ducky兀deltanet.com (Matthew B. Tepper) wrote:
> >I just returned from that store myself, and can confirm that it looks
> >like the first two sets of Toscanini releases are there _in toto_,
> >alone with many of the historical operas
> I saw the Naxos Toscaninis at 4th and Broadway today for $8.99 per
> disc, and I was tempted to have them call Sunset Blvd. for a price
> check, but was afraid that the result would have been to raise the LA
> price rather than lower NY.
My understanding is that individual stores are free to price their
imports as they like. I've tried the "Tower in *wherever* sells this
for *whatever* less than you" with the staff in the 4th Street Tower.
They respond with their customary politeness and sensitivity to their
customers ("Tough shit, bub").
I used to spend thousands of dollars a year at the 4th Street Tower,
but the staff's attitude and the price hikes ticked me off and I buy
from them only if there is no other choice.
I would rather buy from MDT (about the same price as Tower) or even
wait for A&B Sound (though that is sometimes asking too much).
Tony Movshon mov...@nyu.edu
Center for Neural Science New York University
Edward A. Cowan
Fabulous Fifty" Toscanini recordings in Appendix Three of Robert C.
Marsh's _Toscanini and the Art of Conducting_ (published before the
issue of AT's Philadelphia recordings). I would add AT's Philadelphia
recording of the Schubert "Great" C-major symphony to Marsh's choice of
the 1953 NBCSO recording. (The 1947 is too fast and crabbed for
pleasure.)
FWIW, I have the entire "Toscanini Edition", which I bought as separate
CDs, proceeding according to an established hierarchy of priorities,
starting with the Beethoven and Brahms symphonies among the symphonic
works and with the _Otello_ and _Falstaff_ among the operas. Last
acquired were the really poor _Aida_ (alas, the only one of the operas
extant in a video) and the mixed Franck D-minor symphony.
--E.A.C.
Rtsina
>acquired were the really poor _Aida_ (alas, the only one of the operas
>extant in a video) and the mixed Franck D-minor symphony.
Why do you say that the "Aida" is really poor? Other than Helluva Nervy and Eva
Gustavson (both ok but not great), the singers are fine. I couldn't imagine a
performance with better choral singing, orchestral playing or leadership.
Cheers,
DT
Matthew B. Tepper
>
> FWIW, I have the entire "Toscanini Edition", which I bought as
> separate CDs, proceeding according to an established hierarchy of
> priorities, starting with the Beethoven and Brahms symphonies among
> the symphonic works and with the _Otello_ and _Falstaff_ among the
> symphony.
I bought them in a particular order, too -- the order in which they were
released. Thus I was one of the people who helped make for swift sales
at the beginning, ensuring that the entire series would be regarded as
commercially viable. Then, how was I treated? The whole set was
offered, complete with a snazzy cabinet and limited-edition booklet, for
a lower price than I had paid in the first place.
I wrote a letter of complaint to BMG, but you can probably guess the
precise amount of pages I received in reply. Hint: it rhymes with
"hero."
--
Emrla
>released. Thus I was one of the people who helped make for swift sales
>at the beginning, ensuring that the entire series would be regarded as
>commercially viable. Then, how was I treated? The whole set was
>offered, complete with a snazzy cabinet and limited-edition booklet, for
>a lower price than I had paid in the first place.
>
>I wrote a letter of complaint to BMG, but you can probably guess the
>precise amount of pages I received in reply. Hint: it rhymes with
>"hero."
>
>--
>Matthew B. Tepper:
I saw the complete set after I had purchased about half of the set
individually. Actually, I had some fun looking for odds and ends to complete
the set in pretty unlikely places. Purchasing the entire set in one fell swoop
would have deprived me of that adventure - at least I tell myself that. EMR
Edward A. Cowan
> > Last
> >acquired were the really poor _Aida_ (alas, the only one
of the operas
> >extant in a video) and the mixed Franck D-minor symphony.
>
> Why do you say that the "Aida" is really poor? Other than
Helluva Nervy and Eva
> Gustavson (both ok but not great), the singers are fine.
I couldn't imagine a
> performance with better choral singing, orchestral playing
or leadership.
The qualities you cite in favor of Toscanini's _Aida_ recording are, in
fact, the *only* positive qualities in the set. And, as you say, apart
from Nelli and Gustavson (the worst singer in the set, throwing away
lines right and left -- she's even more annoying in the video, where her
pretentious posturings are visible) the singers are at least OK.
But _Aida_ needs not just "OK" singers, it needs great ones, and such
are not to be heard in that performance. It remains valuable, especially
in the video, for the conducting (AT made his conducting debut with this
work). But I would much have preferred to have either the _Falstaff_ or
the _Otello_ in video.
--E.A.C.
khows...@zdnetmail.com
eac...@anet-dfw.com (Edward A. Cowan) wrote:
> FWIW, I have the entire "Toscanini Edition", which I bought as separate
> CDs, proceeding according to an established hierarchy of priorities,
I've got to ask this of EAC and other discophiles: Do you keep a running list
of what you want to buy and go to record stores with it? Or is it all
memorized?
--
K. Howson-Jan
A. F. T.
<Seth.B...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>Thank you, A.F.T., but don't forget about Art Fierro.....Seth B. Winner
Indeed. WHY wasn't American RCA in charge of this new edition,
instead of European producers? Who has heard of the producers and
engineers for the new Red Seal set; I haven't. What is their track
record for producing honest transfers? Can it compare with Jon
Samuels' or Fierro's? Of course, even those two RCA gentlemen often
have to contend with a producer's choice of added stereo reverb now
and then, but in general I found the RCA compact disk reissues of the
past few years fairly reliable, if occasionally one or two would slip
through with extra stereo ambience. But NONE of them have as much as
the awful echo and strange pinched equalization of the Beethoven Ninth
in this new set.
Let me quote from some pertinent comments made by Richard Caniell of
the "Immortal Performances Recording Society" (who has supplied
Richard Gardner's tapes and records for the Naxos Toscanini series):
"As RCA Victor's designate, Arthur Fierro, follows through with his
plan to issue Toscanini commercial (and some broadcast) recordings in
their original sound...However, as reported elsewhere, not even Fierro
can avoid the contaminative influence of egoistic sound engineers and
producers and their mandates, who remain alive and all too well at
RCA." Well, as a sound engineer myself, I can scarcely imagine that I
have ever known anyone of my ilk who was NOT 'egoistical'; it's just
that some of us are purists and want to add as little as possible to
basically good recordings, and others are certain of their taste and
want to impose it on the recording by grossly changing the EQ and
adding echo, expansion, compression, or other characteristics that are
NOT present in the recording. Richard Gardner of RCA, said to be the
Maestro's favorite engineer, was so sick at heart about the echo that
RCA Victor's chief engineer Albert Pulley mandated for the original LP
reissue of the broadcast of Otello that he almost quit...later, he
wished he HAD quit (according to his friend and protege,
Caniell)...many of those who have heard original, undoctored,
pristine, properly reproduced 8-H tapes and acetates (like Seth's
accurate "Academic Festival Overture" transfer) felt that the
Toscanini recordings were certainly "not bad" or that indeed many of
them were very, very good, if given half a chance.
By the way, my apologies for the clumsiness of my original post,
replete with lots of typing errors...I sent it in to the ng in a "writ
of fealous jage" and perhaps my passion is evident from the overuse of
caps and the blunders. But I wouldn't take back anything I have said
about the dreadful dreck in the new edition, which was hyped to record
dealers as being so much better sounding than any previous Toscanini's
that it would overcome customer resistance to old recordings. My
experience, and that of the manager at a large west coast Tower store,
is that when customers are correctly informed about the quality of the
best Toscanini disks (like the RCA Gold Seal CD's of the Beethoven
Ninth, the Respighi tone poems, or even the 78s such as the Rossini
overtures) they buy them, like them, and keep them, coming back for
more.
SO WHY ADD LOTS OF SONIC CRAP TO THEM?
Donald Rice
"A. F. T." wrote:
> On 5 Dec 1998 04:03:31 GMT, "Seth Winner"
> <Seth.B...@worldnet.att.net> wrote:
>
> >Thank you, A.F.T., but don't forget about Art Fierro.....Seth B. Winner
>
> Indeed. WHY wasn't American RCA in charge of this new edition,
> instead of European producers? Who has heard of the producers and
>
<snip a lot if good stuff>
> By the way, my apologies for the clumsiness of my original post,
> replete with lots of typing errors...I sent it in to the ng in a "writ
> of fealous jage" and perhaps my passion is evident from the overuse of
> caps and the blunders. But I wouldn't take back anything I have said
> about the dreadful dreck in the new edition, which was hyped to record
> dealers as being so much better sounding than any previous Toscanini's
> that it would overcome customer resistance to old recordings. My
> experience, and that of the manager at a large west coast Tower store,
> is that when customers are correctly informed about the quality of the
> best Toscanini disks (like the RCA Gold Seal CD's of the Beethoven
> Ninth, the Respighi tone poems, or even the 78s such as the Rossini
> overtures) they buy them, like them, and keep them, coming back for
> more.
>
> SO WHY ADD LOTS OF SONIC CRAP TO THEM?
>
> A FANATICAL TOSCANINIPHILE
>
> "Ignorance is bliss: use a killfile & add to it every day!"
> -- Corno di Bassetto
My thanks to AFT and others who have described the disasterous reissues of
Toscanini's Beethoven recording. I saw them at a Borders and the packaging
and hype were so seductive that I actually wondered if this was the
recording AFT had savaged. It looked so innocent and appealing! I am
delighted with the Gold Seal cds I have and will look only to Naxos for my
next purchases of Maestros recordings.
Don
Cathy and Kip
> "Ignorance is bliss: use a killfile & add to it every day!"
> -- Corno di Bassetto
Has GBS been reborn on AOL, or are you updating Shaw?
Or is someone else using the _nom de plume_ these days?
Anyway, thanks for coming back to the group.
--Kip Williams (rushing past the main point to seize on irrelevancies
again)
--
[we're fooling the spammers today--delete CAPS from address to reply]
Edward A. Cowan
> I've got to ask this of EAC and other discophiles: Do you keep a running list
> of what you want to buy and go to record stores with it? Or is it all
> memorized?
It depends. With large series (e.g., the Hyperion Schubert Lieder
series), of which one might not want to purchase the entire thing, at
least not all at once, then, especially if you already have a few of
them, you keep a list of the ones you have in order not to duplicate any
items. With the Toscanini series, I had to distinguish different
recordings of the same titles (e.g., the Schubert "Great" C-major
symphony, of which AT's Philadelphia Orchestra recording is desirable,
as is the 1953, but not the 1947. I eventually got the 1947 one, but
fairly late in the game. All in all, it's like going to the grocery
store...
--E.A.C.
Matthew B. Tepper
>
>reissues of Toscanini's Beethoven recording. I saw them at a Borders
>and the packaging and hype were so seductive that I actually wondered
>if this was the recording AFT had savaged. It looked so innocent and
>appealing! I am delighted with the Gold Seal cds I have and will look
>only to Naxos for my next purchases of Maestros recordings.
Get the word out -- let people know that the new ones are screwed up,
and be sure and tell them about the Naxos series (and how/where one can
obtain those)! Give BMG the finger -- it's evidently all they deserve.
Frank Berger
Everyone is praising the Gold Seal releases. Is Naxos releasing the same
or different recordings? If the same, how do the masterings compare to
the Gold Seal ones? If the Gold Seals are so good, why then the interest
in Naxos?
Simon Roberts
: Perhaps someone will be kind enough to clear up some confusion on my part.
: Everyone is praising the Gold Seal releases. Is Naxos releasing the same
: or different recordings? If the same, how do the masterings compare to
: the Gold Seal ones? If the Gold Seals are so good, why then the interest
: in Naxos?
Most (all?) are different performances; some of them (e.g. the wonderful
Mozart 595 with Horszowski) I've never encountered before, others (the
Beethoven symphonies, the Brahms cto 2/sym 1 etc.) have shown up on other
labels such as Melodram, Relief and Gramophono 2000 (the one comparison
I've been able to make so far -- Leonore I -- reveals the Naxos to be far
superior to the Gramophono 2000 in every respect (the latter sounds, by
comparison, like an unstable radio broadcast played under water to which
echo has been added)).
Simon
Don Drewecki
The difference between the BMG/RCA and Naxos series has to do with how
and when AT's recordings were made. Toscanini, particularly in the last
seven years of his career, made commercial recordings of works he played
in his NBC Symphony broadcasts. That is, after the Saturday or Sunday
concert, AT would record some of that week's music in genuine recording
sessions a few days later. However, he didn't record everything he
performed, or didn't approve everything he did record. That's where RCA
Victor started issuing transfers of the broadcast concert performances.
What Naxos does now, apparently, is to issue that actual concert
performances, with commentary, which RCA never did -- they often cut off
the applause (sometimes at his request), and never included the
commentary. Moreover, Toscanini held very few formal recording sessions
during the first years at NBC, which is what Naxos is focused on --
complete early NBC Symphony broadcasts.
However, the 1991-92 BMG/RCA Gold Seals are reissues of what AT
authorized, be they from sessions or concerts. 75% of those titles were
excellently remastered in honest mono; 25% were not, and some of that
25% are horrible. The Naxos titles are not taken from the actual inside
sources (which exist only at the Toscanini Archives at Lincoln Center,
and at the Library of Congress), and there is some slight fake-stereo
effect added, but all the announcements are there.
That's as brief a summary as I can make of the differences between BMG
and Naxos.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Curtis Croulet
>symphony, of which AT's Philadelphia Orchestra recording is desirable,
>as is the 1953, but not the 1947.
Sorry, I like this one.
Chuck Nessa
CN
"A. F. T." wrote:
> Caniell is a purist, and does not do anything
> objectionable to the sound quality. We hear the virtues/defects of
> his source material, received from Gardner via Walter Toscanini or the
> Maestro from diverse broadcast airchecks, line checks, or test
> pressing acetates.
>
> A FANATICAL TOSCANINIPHILE
Ethan Prater
>I really cannot imagine ANY Toscanini collector who has been exposed
>to accurate source material, objecting to the quality of the Naxos
>series!
Is it true that the Naxos Beethoven Third Concerto disc has dramatic pitch
problems, a la the Naxos Met Opera sets?
There's more to a transfer than whether its "pure single channel mono."
FWIW, my highly unscientific spot checks of the Mendelssohn/Wagner disc on
Naxos reveal no significant pitch irregularities.
A. F. T.
>
>The difference between the BMG/RCA and Naxos series has to do with how
>and when AT's recordings were made...What Naxos does now, apparently, is to issue that actual concert
>performances, with commentary, which RCA never did -- they often cut off
>the applause (sometimes at his request), and never included the
>commentary. Moreover, Toscanini held very few formal recording sessions
>during the first years at NBC, which is what Naxos is focused on --
>complete early NBC Symphony broadcasts.
And Naxos is using a set of recordings that were collected by Richard
Gardner, an RCA Victor engineer working at Victor's 24th Street Studio
in NY, who became the Maestro's "favorite sound engineer", we are
told, and a family intimate: Toscanini himself GAVE Gardner the tape
dub source of the famous 1940 all-Debussy concert, so these are
"authorized" by the conductor, if not by the Toscanini family and
Victor and all their heirs and assigns. In some cases, the material
of the Gardner collection appears to be augmented by some of the
Paneyko aircheck recordings made on acetates in the forties, and
perhaps from off-air copies of the WRVR rebroadcasts of the early
sixties, where many of us heard the old programs from the thirties and
early forties for the first time...these tapes were bootlegged by many
European record companies, and have sourced some CD's ranging from the
superb Dell'Arte issues, to the wretched refuse of Grammofono 2000 and
other 'cheezy' Italian compact disk issues.
>However, the 1991-92 BMG/RCA Gold Seals are reissues of what AT
>authorized, be they from sessions or concerts. 75% of those titles were
>excellently remastered in honest mono; 25% were not, and some of that
>25% are horrible.
Without having access to the original material in the NY Library
copies, as Don has, I cannot honestly say that to my ears, the CD
transfers in the BMG set ever approach "horrible"...there are certain
deviations from perfection, however: the Rhenish symphony transfer, as
well as the 1949 Parsifal excerpts, are taken from 78 rpm disks (the
Schumann being apparently an aircheck set, the Parsifal from a
collector's shellac set) instead of being made from the magnetic tape
masters; even as recently as the Victrola set of the late sixties, the
magnetic tapes of these performances were used, and they sounded
better. I would guess that somehow, the modern producers overlooked
this and used other sources, or that the tapes had deteriorated, or
that they are "lost" (rumor has it that certain people may have made
off with some of them!)
What I hear in the BMG set that is somewhat inferior, aside from these
two examples, are the sets with fake stereo: but the added ambience is
usually quite subtle, and not ladled on with the extreme carelessness
of the Grammofono/Iron Needle butchers, or even with the tastelessness
of the current crew making the new so-called "20-bit" editions of
Beethoven for Red Seal. And there are very few that have fake stereo:
one thinks of the "Blue Danube" disk of short pieces, the Strauss Don
Quixote disk, and the New World Symphony disk; the vast majority are
in pure mono.
>The Naxos titles are not taken from the actual inside
>sources (which exist only at the Toscanini Archives at Lincoln Center,
>and at the Library of Congress), and there is some slight fake-stereo
>effect added, but all the announcements are there.
Don, there is NO trace of fake stereo in any of the Naxos disks. They
are pure single-channel mono. I have heard all of the first set of
releases except the Eroica of '39 (which I didn't feel I needed, since
the Gold Seal transfer by Winner/Marston is so successful) and the
Tchaikovsky Manfred, which is presented so well on the Music & Arts
Tchaikovsky set...the Naxos edition DOES use Cedar, both for
de-clicking and some de-noising, but it is not NEARLY as poorly
applied as done by Iron Needle or Grammofono...it is in the range of
acceptability for all of the issues I have heard or purchased. If
there were fake stereo in the set, I would have been cussing and
screaming about it for months and months!
I really cannot imagine ANY Toscanini collector who has been exposed
to accurate source material, objecting to the quality of the Naxos
series! Furthermore, anyone who ridicules the Gold Seal edition is
just plain compulsive-obsessive, or is simply ignorant of the body of
previous RCA releases of the same material and cannot properly
evaluate the excellence of the Gold Seal Toscanini edition.
I recently had the opportunity of hearing some of the material put out
by Caniell in his Immortal Performances Recording Society, and I can
say that it is exactly the same quality as the best "in house" second
sources we have ever heard, and is sans the Cedaring...that, I
presume, has been used only for the Naxos CD transfers, and has been
done by Naxos. Caniell is a purist, and does not do anything
objectionable to the sound quality. We hear the virtues/defects of
his source material, received from Gardner via Walter Toscanini or the
Maestro from diverse broadcast airchecks, line checks, or test
pressing acetates.
A FANATICAL TOSCANINIPHILE
"Ignorance is bliss: use a killfile & add to it every day!"
-- Corno di Bassetto
Don Drewecki
AFT:
OK, I might as well tabulate here, based on what I remember:
I said that 25% of the BMG/RCA AT Collection titles are not remastered.
Strictly speaking, that's not true: Some of that 25% ARE remastered,
but badly:
Here are the bad remasters (I don't have access to a Schwann here):
Schumann Rhenish disc
Wagner Parsifal excerpts, etc.
Schubert Ninth (1947)
Tchaikovsky Sixth (1947)
Here are the titles not remastered at all, and some in fake stereo:
Pops collection including Blue Danube and Toy Symphony
Strauss Death and Trans/Don Quixote
Dvorak New World/Kodaly Hary Janos
Berlioz complete Romeo and Juliet (2 CDs)
Philadelphia recordings (4 CDs)
Haydn Symphonies/Sinfonia Concertante (2 CDs)
Beethoven Violin Concerto/Piano Con. No.3 (Heifetz/Rubinstein)
It's possible that I've overlooked a few things, as I never bought every
last AT Collection title. So, actually, the figure of unsatisfactory
issues in this series is about 20%. I apologize for not doing my math.
However, as you see, the fact that they did an unsatisfactory job on 20%
of the series, including major items, is reason enough to condemn BMG.
And, they issued one video with bad sound (the 1948 Beethoven Ninth),
and another (the 1948 all-Wagner) with sound that is less impressive
than other sources.
As for Naxos, didn't you say, AFT, that some titles have been affected
by a slight amount of stereo trickery or added reverb? And even if some
of the tapes come from the late Dick Gardner's collection, that means
those transfers were "mastered" with 1950s gear rather than today's.
I'm not saying the sound of this series is not good (as I haven't heard
them yet). I AM saying they are not newly, digitally remastered from
the finest inside sources.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Raymond Edwards
There is a uniform markup from cost for everything that we sell that is
set by corporate management. Tower Sunset has evidently mistakenly priced
the Naxos Historical series (purchased from a UK distributor) below our
cost.
Raymond Edwards
Tower Records
Tony Movshon wrote:
> per...@mindspring.com (Marc Perman) writes:
A. F. T.
>I said that 25% of the BMG/RCA AT Collection titles are not remastered.
>Strictly speaking, that's not true: Some of that 25% ARE remastered,
>but badly:
>Here are the bad remasters (I don't have access to a Schwann here):
>Schumann Rhenish disc
>Wagner Parsifal excerpts, etc.
The Wagner was done from a set of collector's acetates (I know whose,
but have no permission to state the source) and is inferior to the
last edition on Victrola, which was made from at least a copy of the
magnetic tape master. The Rhenish was apparently done from 78s, too,
whether from test disks or some release copy, I could not say. The
sound is somewhat cleaner than the Wagner, but lacking in the very
smooth, extended top end in the Victrola LP issue. However, one who
has had the first release on LM series Red Seal, will still find this
BMG compact disk transfer to be much better sounding, as the Red Seal
(spreading the symphony un-generously over both sides of a long-play
disk) sounded AWFUL...it was shrill, totally lacking in bass, and had
a funny pinched, filtered sound quality, as though there was a line
amp or equalizer on the verge of feedback. A truly dreadful release,
which for YEARS prevented me from enjoying or properly evaluating the
performance. The old Rhenish aircheck from the thirties' broadcast
sounded better than this 1949-derived LP release. When the Victrola
came out, I was finally able to enjoy the performance.
The BMG CD is in the middle ground between the Victrola and the Red
Seal; it is solid and has good presence, but has a limited frequency
response and some slight 78-rpm surface noise. No one has explained
why this source was used.
>Schubert Ninth (1947)
>Tchaikovsky Sixth (1947)
In my experience of having owned both works in the "1950 Toscanini
Tour" commemorative Red Seal editions, the BMG Gold Seal CD transfers
sound much better. The Victrola of the Pathetique was not especially
good, but it lacked what sounded like some extra ambience in the
"enhanced" Red Seal LP issue of the late fifties/early sixties. In
comparison, the BMG copies are very clean and honest sounding, like
the best possible transfer one could make from shellac sets, with NO
added tomfoolery. If this is "bad" then I wonder why? The important
thing here is, to my way of thinking, to compare the release with what
has gone before in commercial Victor pressings, NOT to compare it with
what is in the NY Public Library collection. Only a few of us can go
there to hear the recordings; all the rest of the Toscanini collectors
around the world have access only to commercial pressings (though a
tiny select few can obtain tapes from certain sources; tapes that are
not strictly legal.) So I want to compare the transfer quality with
the ones that have been legally available over the counter at record
dealers, and not to elusive, unobtainable source material.
>Here are the titles not remastered at all, and some in fake stereo:
>
>Pops collection including Blue Danube and Toy Symphony
>Strauss Death and Trans/Don Quixote
>Dvorak New World/Kodaly Hary Janos
There is some slight extra stereo ambience (more in the Blue Danube
set, and less in the Strauss and Dvorak/Kodaly CD's) in these
transfers, a la Dutton. The monaural source material is fully
centered, with a "bath" of stereo echo surrounding it at a low
amplitude. Since some of the ambient components sound out of phase,
at least SOME of this echo disappears when the disks are played back
in L+R mono. Then the CD transfers sound very good.
>Berlioz complete Romeo and Juliet (2 CDs)
This transfer, in genuine and very solid single-channel mono, is
excellent compared to the sixties Red Seal 2-LP release, which had
limited HF response and sounded "old"...there the audio quality is
very crisp and clear (perhaps extending up to 9 or 10 kHz) and there
is no extra ambience added, so that we get good 8-H balances. The
bass response is adequate, too. The transfer of the earlier and later
recordings of Bizet are perfectly fine, too.
>Philadelphia recordings (4 CDs)
To my ears, this sounds exactly like the complete set issued on LP by
RCA Victor in the seventies. There are the same defects (distortion
on peaks, high general noise level) but the recordings are perfectly
listenable. I believe that I might have a preference for the original
Soria series Red Seal of the Schubert Ninth, but one could hear manual
de-ticking on some shortened note values.
>Haydn Symphonies/Sinfonia Concertante (2 CDs)
Again, these are admirably better than earlier Victor releases: the
Sinfonia Concertante broadcast is much more transparent than the LP
transfer in the 1967 commemorative 5-disk set; the earlier symphony
recordings are not at all inferior to what I personally transferred
from shellac sets. The 98th sounds exactly like the Japanese Victor
LP transfer I obtained in the late seventies: it is not absolutely
noise free, but it is clear and well-balanced. The Surprise sounds
magnificent: it SHOULD, as a 30 ips high fidelity tape made in
Carnegie Hall in '53; the 88th sounds like a dub I made from the
shellacs many years ago, sans the noise I couldn't get rid of with my
old analogue equipment. Again, if there is an elusive, unavailable
source that is better for any of these recordings, I can live with
that knowledge in light of the perfectly tolerable quality of these
honest single-channel mono transfers.
>Beethoven Violin Concerto/Piano Con. No.3 (Heifetz/Rubinstein)
This sounds very much like the early CD transfer, which was miles
ahead of any earlier issue. The 78s of the violin concerto were, to
my ears, almost unlistenably flat and tinny. The seventies LP issue
(in a 2-LP Heifetz set that contained also his mid-fifties' recording
of the Kreutzer sonata) had severe hum; this is missing in the CD
transfer, which is bright, clear, clean, has tolerably balanced bass,
NO hum, and very little distortion or mechanical disk artifacts. The
transfer is genuine mono.
The Rubinstein performance sounded just awful on the shellac set,
which had wow on almost every side. I believe there may have been a
Vault Treasures LP which was available for a short time in the early
fifties; I missed it. The BMG CD is magnificent: it has shockingly
bright and clear, transparent, and immediate sound! Compare it with
the dreadful abomination on Piano Library, which has been over-Cedared
and is totally lacking in transparency and ambience. The BMG transfer
has just slight evidence of acetate noise from time to time; yet the
overall quality is completely satisfactory, and redeems the
performance. If Marsh or other critics had heard the reading in such
an admirable transfer, the performance would have been more highly
regarded. In some ways, I prefer it to the Hess/Toscanini from '46:
there are interesting touches in the orchestral accompaniment (some
"headlong" tempi and very inflected phrasing) that give the piece a
dramatic characterization that it has lost in many modern
"streamlined" and perfect CD readings.
>It's possible that I've overlooked a few things, as I never bought every
>last AT Collection title. So, actually, the figure of unsatisfactory
>issues in this series is about 20%. I apologize for not doing my math.
I have every one. They have been played many, many times on a variety
of equipment, ranging from car players, Walkman-types, and home
equipment of varying quality. I continue to receive unalloyed
pleasure from the series; it pains me to consider -- after the
immeasurable leap forward compared to earlier Victor releases -- that
some people keep describing its deficiencies without acknowledging its
virtues. If BMG has no "reference point", since EVERY Toscanini issue
on Victor, RCA, or BMG is derided, then we will be sure of no
improvements in the future; only botched attempts, such as the latest
RCA Red Seal issue of the Beethoven symphonies in fake stereo.
Is there NO ONE here on the ng who like the Gold Seal TOSCANINI
COLLECTION? Does EVERYONE think it sounds bad? Do all readers think
it is WORSE than earlier issues?
>However, as you see, the fact that they did an unsatisfactory job on 20%
>of the series, including major items, is reason enough to condemn BMG.
I really do not consider that they did a bad job on 20% of them;
perhaps just a few titles are not up to the best of previous issues.
Don, please explain this contention: is the BMG set "BAD" because it
does not live up to the elusive, unobtainable "best" at the NY Public
Library, or it is "BAD" in absolute terms, compared to earlier Victor
issues? Life is short, and I have been collecting these recordings
dating as far back as 1952 when I obtained my first one. As a
recording engineer, I think that RCA reached a point with ALMOST ALL
of the Gold Seal set where they surpassed every single previous
commercial issue on 78's, 45's, and LP's. Are you contending that
these are WORSE than the previous issues?
>And, they issued one video with bad sound (the 1948 Beethoven Ninth),
>and another (the 1948 all-Wagner) with sound that is less impressive
>than other sources.
The Beethoven Ninth video, played back on the HiFi VHS machines I have
owned, sounds better than the Clyde Key edition on ATS LP. The sound
is in no way "BAD" to my ears...it is dry but well-balanced "Johnston"
position 8-H pickup, with marvelous clarity, and plenty of extension
on the high and low end of the spectrum. It is amazing that a set of
transcription disks from 1948 could sound this good! Why is "BAD"?
The 1948 Wagner excerpts also sound better than the Clyde Key set,
though I do hear some peak limiting in the Tannhauser (I suspect that
an FM source disk by Paneyko provided the audio, NOT a line check
acetate.) WHERE are the "other sources" that are better? Are they
commercially available, or does one have to travel to NY to hear them
ONCE per visit?
>As for Naxos, didn't you say, AFT, that some titles have been affected
>by a slight amount of stereo trickery or added reverb?
No. Never said that. Check what I posted. I recently sent ALL my
comments about the Naxos releases to Klaus Heymann and Richard
Caniell, and I read through them before sending the email attachments.
There was no comment made about fake stereo, 'cause there is NO fake
stereo.
>And even if some of the tapes come from the late Dick Gardner's collection, that means
>those transfers were "mastered" with 1950s gear rather than today's.
Well, maybe so. But if the result sounds infinitely better, cleaner,
and more transparent than any prior RCA Victor, Victrola, or British
or German Victor transfer, then SO WHAT?
I am beginning to suspect that the "Tinkertoy" tapes made at 30 ips
from the sessions taken down on magnetic tape, are no longer available
(a certain person is said to have appropriated many of them sometime
in the fifties, after copying them with "enhancements" of equalization
and, in some case, limiting); only some archivist at RCA could provide
the true answer. The Pfeiffer TOSCANINI COLLECTION was done by a
variety of supervisors: Pfeiffer himself, and a few others. In some
cases, originals were used (such as the acetates credited to Winner et
al); in most cases, the sources were 15 ips "approval" tapes given to
Walter Toscanini for Maestro's consideration, prior to LP issue. That
means that, yes, the dubs from the 30 ips masters were done in the
early fifties. Considering that fact, the results are exceptionally
fine. I have NO intentions of traveling to NY to hear the library
copies; the BMG set gets me as close as I need to get to the source of
Toscanini's genius. Augmented by certain "aircheck" releases on
Naxos, Music & Arts, and other labels, one can finally obtain nearly
the entirety of Toscanini's active concert repertoire of the period of
the thirties to his retirement. During HIS LIFETIME this was not
possible; it couldn't be done during the LP era; now it can be
achieved by any enthusiast who can afford these inexpensive disks.
What a boon to humankind! Yet there are grouches who would gainsay
this tremendous undertaking. I can only imagine that B. H. Haggin
would, if confronted with the totality of the BMG set, convey his
blessings: he would criticize the FEW departures from perfection (no
where NEAR 20 or 25% in my estimation) but would be very grateful.
Now, I have nothing but admiration for Don Drewecki's encyclopedic
knowledge of recording technology and Toscanini history; I just want
to put the matter in the perspective of someone on the OUTSIDE as a
record collector, compared to an INSIDER who has access to private
source material or the best items obtained by his friend and colleague
Seth Winner.
A. F. T.
<pra...@interport.net> wrote:
>Also sprach A. F. T....
>
>>I really cannot imagine ANY Toscanini collector who has been exposed
>>to accurate source material, objecting to the quality of the Naxos
>>series!
>
>Is it true that the Naxos Beethoven Third Concerto disc has dramatic pitch
>problems, a la the Naxos Met Opera sets?
>
>There's more to a transfer than whether its "pure single channel mono."
>
I posted an extremely lengthy series of comments on the pitch
departures in the first set of issues.
Here's part of what I said a few months ago:
In answer to Alrod's comments about pitch shifts, I FIRST posted the
following:
Re: The Naxos TOSCANINI CONCERT EDITION So Far...
Date: 1998/10/08
On Thu, 08 Oct 1998 15:38:00 GMT, in rec.music.classical.recordings
you wrote:
>Did you notice if all the pitching was accurate? Some of the Naxos
>Metropolitan Operas transfer Richard Caniell's tapes too high. (Thank
>God I held on to that variable speed CD player.)
>
>Alrod
Sorry to say that I do not have absolute pitch, and before writing my
review I did not think to get out a pitch pipe or go to our
(constantly
retuned) pianos to check.
I have exquisitely sensitive sense of relative pitch, or the ability
to detect wow or flutter, and when I hear transcriptions joined
together that are even 2 Hz off pitch, I can detect it (as a record
producer and engineer, I once had to constantly admonish a lutenist to
retune during a recording session; he couldn't detect when his lute
went out, but I could)...the BMG set is very good as regards constant
pitch, the Gramofono and Iron Needles vary more than a semitone in
some works, such as the Martucci First Symphony, and the Naxos set did
NOT jump out and alert me to pitch problems in side-joins...I just had
time to listen to 5 of the 6 albums all the way through and to sample
the sixth, so what I heard in order to be able to write down my
quickest impressions of transfer quality did not have demonstrate
noticeable flaws to my non-perfect-pitch trained ears.
Even my wife, a concert pianist, pedagogue, and keyboard instructor of
30 yrs. experience, does not have perfect pitch, and cannot instantly
identify a speed error...we both consider this a sort of blessing when
investigating historical piano recordings!
There is a VERY slight speed variation in part of the second movement
of the Mozart Concerto No. 27, so slight that I did not want to water
down my positive review, since it was in the master disks they used
(former copies on tape of the program had this same defect): in
general, I wanted to concentrate on problems introduced by Naxos, if
any, rather than just the admitted defects of the source material, and
I was thrilled to find the Naxos production not only competently, but
also excellently accomplished.
John Corbett's transfers of Toscanini transcriptions, broadcast on
WRVR, had considerable pitch problems at side joins (he must have used
a table driven by a hysteresis-synchronous AC motor); of course,
anybody worth his salt these days uses a variable-speed electronic
servo turntable, or something like the monstrosity of Seth Winner
described in the notes to the Sony Masterworks Heritage series.
I did synch the Naxos transcription of the Leonore Ov. #2 (1939, on
8.110813) with the RCA / BMG transfer on Vol 45, track 6 (same
performance) and found that they agreed to the Hertz.
I repeated this test by synching the VPO/Abbado DDD recording of Leo
#2 on DGG 429 762-2 with the Naxos AT transfer, and found that either
the VPO tunes their A about 2 Hertz higher, or BOTH the Naxos and RCA
/ BMG digitizings are slightly lower in pitch.
Beyond that, I do not care about absolute pitch problems, as we don't
intend to play or sing along with these old Toscanini broadcasts.
AFT
Then, after considering the matter further, I added the following:
Re: The Naxos TOSCANINI CONCERT EDITION So Far...
Date: 1998/10/09 On
Fri, 09 Oct 1998 01:22:24 GMT, nfna...@NOSPAM.rocketmail.com
wrote:
>Did you notice if all the pitching was accurate?... the problem with
>the Met broadcasts was not so much the side joins, though these
>are occasionally problematic. I don't have perfect
>pitch either. I do find that a whole performance up a half-step can be
>disorienting, as in Bach's C-minor Mass or his Air on a G-sharp
>String.
>Alrod
I did some further analysis, and came up with results you may find
useful.
First, my wife can actually trace a certain amount of musical lineage
back to Dame Myra Hess, who taught her most prominent teacher. My
wife has the C Minor concerto in her repertoire, and has performed it
in public.
I played the Naxos transfer of the Hess/Toscanini last movement for
her in our music studio. I asked if she thought it was OK, or if
there was "anything obviously wrong" (remember, she does not have
perfect pitch.)
She scrunched up her face and said, "It sounds sort of strange!" She
went to our grand and played a few passages: our recently tuned Yamaha
C-7 was very much flatter sounding than the CD. So, on a careful
comparison the CD was at least a semitone sharp; we confirmed with our
Casio tuner that our own grand piano was OK.
Then I checked excerpts of a few other items as time permitted:
The Mozart Concerto No. 27 finale: it is bang-on with our piano.
The Mozart Haffner: out of about 6,000 CDs in our collections, it was
very hard -- if not impossible -- to find an all DDD recording by an
American orchestra that tunes to A=440. So I had to settle for the
DDD Capriccio recording of 1990 by Graf and the Salzburg Mozarteum.
It was very close to the Naxos Toscanini; maybe off a Hertz or so.
But you may note, if you are a very sensitive listener, that in the
opening of the Naxos Haffner and at least a bit of the 2nd movement of
the Concerto that the original transcription disks had a VERY slight
wow; I have heard MUCH worse than this on competing labels' issues of
Toscanini, and even in Victor's own LP transfers of certain material:
I believe I recall that a sixties LP reissue of the Heifetz/AT
Beethoven Concerto had very bad wow during some of the 78 sides,
though I checked my LP pressing and found it to be perfectly on
center.
Beethoven Eighth: my ONLY DDD copy was Kegel's; all our other CDs were
ADD; Kegel and Toscanini's '39 broadcast were about as far off as the
Haffner situation: close but not absolutely dead on: this could be
different orchestral tuning, European vs. American. But it was
nowhere near a semitone off.
Beethoven Fifth: Bang on in comparison to Kegel.
Beethoven Triple Concerto: agreed perfectly with the Barenboim DDD on
Angel, or the Walter ADD on Sony.
Debussy La Mer, Second Movement: Naxos '40 is perfectly in tune with
RCA/BMG Toscanini of '50.
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto: Heifetz on Naxos seems nearly a semitone
sharp compared to Heifetz/Munch on RCA 5933-2-RC compact disk
transfer; I don't have the latest Living Stereo version.
So the only performance that is so noticeably off speed as to POSSIBLY
make a slight difference in musical impression is the Beethoven 3rd
Concerto; I don't think the Heifetz pitch error is quite as much, but
it is still somewhat sharp. I could NOT find an all DDD American
recording of the Mendelssohn in my library...just scads of great old
violinists from Stern back to Szigeti and Kreisler. I did not have
time to check everything with the piano, or to try all the movements
of each work: that would have been a day-long task...
- - - -
Indeed, there is "more to a transfer than whether it's 'pure single
channel mono"; one must consider many aspects of the quality of a
transfer.
But how many of us have PERFECT PITCH?
It is true that a certain change in artistic character will be noted
if the pitch is shifted up or down a semitone; under that, there will
be little to bother an average listener. If it is off just a few Hz
relative to A=440 (or whatever the original tuning) few of us will
notice it except in a direct live A-B comparison to another source. a
2 or 3 Hz difference is to be expected as just about the NORM in
investigating most analogue-to-digital transfers!
I recall some sessions I conducted for a Musical Heritage Society LP
recording I produced in the sixties: the solo artist, who was playing
a stringed instrument, could NOT stay on pitch from piece to piece;
when he retuned, he often got it wrong. I had to constantly remind
him that he was not tuning right! So even musicians, without
immediate access to a pitch pipe, will not always tune to exact pitch!
Sir Henry Wood had a fetish about this, and it is said that he spent
entire rehearsal sessions having the orchestra members tune over and
over until everybody was sick of the process; other musicians are not
so compulsive.
Now, I have made some comparisons of pitch with LP's recently, using a
Technics turntable that has adjustable speed and features a strobe so
that one can set it for "correct" mechanical speed or the audible
pitch desired (my wife used this for her old "Music Minus One" LP's
when she was preparing concerti.) I made some checks of the old
Victor Vault Treasures LCT issue of the 1929 Rachmaninoff Piano Cto #2
by Rachmaninoff with the PO under Stokowski, compared to the Biddulph
transfer by Mark Obert-Thorn. I found to my complete amazement that
the Victor LP transfer was MORE than a semitone SHARP! It required
drastic adjustment of the speed control to equal the pitch with modern
American recordings with the same exact orchestral tuning, or with
MO-T's Biddulph transfer (which agreed PRECISELY with modern DDD
source material in relation to pitch.)
So, don't imagine for a moment that pitch problems are limited only to
modern CD transfers!
Rtsina
>Beethoven Violin Concerto/Piano Con. No.3 (Heifetz/Rubinstein)
This sounds very much like the early CD transfer, which was miles
ahead of any earlier issue. The 78s of the violin concerto were, to
my ears, almost unlistenably flat and tinny. The seventies LP issue
(in a 2-LP Heifetz set that contained also his mid-fifties' recording
of the Kreutzer sonata) had severe hum; this is missing in the CD
transfer, which is bright, clear, clean, has tolerably balanced bass,
NO hum, and very little distortion or mechanical disk artifacts. The
transfer is genuine mono.
The Rubinstein performance sounded just awful on the shellac set,
which had wow on almost every side. I believe there may have been a
Vault Treasures LP which was available for a short time in the early
fifties; I missed it. The BMG CD is magnificent: it has shockingly
bright and clear, transparent, and immediate sound!
I have the LCT "Vault Treasures" lp issue on an early pressing. That version
features nasal sound and somewhat less wow than the 78s. The Gold Seal CD is
orders of magnitude better.
The Beethoven Ninth video, played back on the HiFi VHS machines I have
owned, sounds better than the Clyde Key edition on ATS LP. The sound
is in no way "BAD" to my ears...it is dry but well-balanced "Johnston"
position 8-H pickup, with marvelous clarity, and plenty of extension
on the high and low end of the spectrum. It is amazing that a set of
transcription disks from 1948 could sound this good! Why is "BAD"?
I think the sound is BAD in this case, compared to the outstanding high
fidelity broadcast preserved on my ATS disks of the 1948 9th. There's just no
comparison. The video is pinched and somewhat deficient in presence; and the
ATS disk is just stunning hi-fi. BMG screwed up.
>And even if some of the tapes come from the late Dick Gardner's collection,
that means
>those transfers were "mastered" with 1950s gear rather than today's.
Well, maybe so. But if the result sounds infinitely better, cleaner,
and more transparent than any prior RCA Victor, Victrola, or British
or German Victor transfer, then SO WHAT?
I'm with you. When RCA/BMG does something right we should reinforce it with
praise, not all the whining that afflicts this newsgroup.
I can only imagine that B. H. Haggin
would, if confronted with the totality of the BMG set, convey his
blessings: he would criticize the FEW departures from perfection (no
where NEAR 20 or 25% in my estimation) but would be very grateful.
DT
Don Drewecki
AFT:
My comparison is the results of the BMG Toscanini Collection, against
what Jack Pfeiffer (in press releases) and Mort Frank (in Fanfare)
promised it would be -- a series based precisely on those "unaccessible"
Toscanini Archives sources. That was the promise they made, that was
the promise they should have kept. For 20% of the series, they didn't.
That's my bottom line.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Don Drewecki
The 1948 Beethoven Ninth telecast has serious problems of breakup in
loud passages, plus low-level hum and grinding noises in the third
movement. That's off of my VHS video tape, bought in a store six or
seven years ago. The 1948 all-Wagner also sounds inferior -- less
clean, more scratchy -- to a tape source I bought 15 years ago. (And,
I'm talking about the VHS HiFi tracks, not the linear mono one.)
Again, BMG/RCA claimed they would do it right -- the fact that major
items such as the masters of Berlioz Romeo, the Philadelphia things, and
30 ips tape master of the 1949 Rhenish were never used is a MAJOR black
mark against Jack Pfeiffer, in my opinion, and reviewers like Mort
Frank, who assured us that Jack was leveling with us this time around.
The Beethoven/Heifetz concerto is the Jack dub of 1970, with some added
fake reverb.
I stand by my other points.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Curtis Croulet
What previous edition was used as a reference? Several years ago a similar
discussion popped up in another forum, so I spent an afternoon comparing the
Toscanini Collection issue of the Rhenish with the Victrola LP - fake
stereo, but it was praised as superior. Although they were definitely
different, I heard nothing that would lead me to declare the CD inferior to
the LP.
A. F. T.
>I think the sound is BAD [video of 1948 Beethoven Ninth] in this case, compared to the outstanding high
>fidelity broadcast preserved on my ATS disks of the 1948 9th. There's just no
>comparison. The video is pinched and somewhat deficient in presence; and the
>ATS disk is just stunning hi-fi. BMG screwed up.
When I first got the video, I still had the ATS disk, and did not come
to the same conclusion, but I take your word for it, as I no longer
have the ATS set. Comparisons are no longer possible for me, but I
defer to your modern experience, and discard my remembrance of the
sound c.1990.
The story that I heard back then was that RCA had either lost the film
soundtrack, or had one that was so deficient that they were forced to
go to Seth Winner for the same source material that Clyde Key had
used...thus began Winner's involvement with the BMG Toscanini project.
Is this true?
I must say that if I listen to the linear audio tracks of the video
cassette of the '48 Ninth, they are truly poor, compared to the HiFi
tracks, where the high frequencies open up. Perhaps the comparison of
videotape to LP record is fraught with many difficulties (the HiFi
tracks on the VHS system DO use some companding, and maybe there're
many slips 'twixt the cup and the lip...)
A. F. T.
>The 1948 Beethoven Ninth telecast has serious problems of breakup in
>loud passages, plus low-level hum and grinding noises in the third
>movement. That's off of my VHS video tape, bought in a store six or
>seven years ago.
I appreciate your specifics about the sound quality. Last year I made
a "convenience cassette" for audio playback only from the HiFi tracks
of my copy of the video, and I am playing it now. Since the recording
source was so old, I used only a type-1 TDK cassette and Dolby
B...what I am listening to has NO trace of distortion on most of the
loud passages, and almost no background noise of any type (my Zenith
HiFi VCR has a very minimum of the low frequency background hum of the
HiFi tracks which is, I have read, "built in" to the system and is
leakage from some kind of video interference, and is always present --
one of the reasons for the companding of the audio on the HiFi tracks
to minimize the noise -- I would guess that the audio S/N ratio from
unmodulated sections of the videocassette on my machine is approaching
60 or 65 dB or better.)
The 8-H balances are almost perfect in respect to the mike placement:
utter clarity of the ensemble without any sense of an unnatural
multiple-miked mixdown (a fault of some of the Richard Mohr
productions in Carnegie Hall, such as the Missa Solemnis.)
The sharp timpani outbursts of Karl Glassman during the latter parts
of the first movement are perfectly clear and clean, with no sense of
overload or squashing. I would guess that the highs extend up to
about 9 or 10 kHz (my taped copy was made "purely" with absolutely no
equalization, so it should sound almost exactly like the audio outputs
of my Zenith HiFi VCR, plus a little bit of extra cassette tape hiss;
I have adjusted my Sony K679ES's bias and EQ controls so that my
typical source/tape difference is absolutely minimal. I could go and
drag the Zenith into my office, but that would be an onerous task just
to report here on the ng, so I am relying on my audio cassette dub:
after all, it can only sound WORSE than the videotape's sound track.
There is a very slight sense of constriction on one or two of the
peaks at the end of the first movement: it sounds more to me like
limiting and IM distortion from the disk cutting process than
degradation from the tape generations and dubbing.
The second movement is, again, clear and transparent, with no strain
on most passages.
The third movement segment appears to come from a completely different
source than the disk for the second movement's ending passages: there
is an immediate increase in mechanical noise, a very SLIGHT low
frequency rumbling -- which I believe is originated in the original
acetate cutting process, probably by the lathe's characteristics --
and some very vague distortion right at the beginning of the movement,
which disappears by the entry of the string section. I turned up the
level to excruciating volume, and can hear almost nothing
objectionable by the time we are a minute or two into the movement,
save only the occasional reminder that the source is a disk and not a
quieter magnetic tape. The rumbling was absolutely gone by that
point, and the signal was clean and clear through the remainder of the
movement that I audited; I did notice a tiny "jerk" in pitch on one
note a few minutes in, but other than that, all was quite well.
I think we are back to the "first" source cutting machine in the last
movement: there are more extended highs than in the Adagio, and a
slightly lower background noise level. The tenor solo and its
"martial" accompaniment, and the chorus, are absolutely clear and
clean to my ears: just a bit thin, as well as lacking in the richness
and brilliance in the comparable section in the '52 commercial Ninth,
which is a performance that, overall, is more "outgoing" and
monumental than the relatively clinical and careful '48 version.
There IS a pitch droop at the end of the fugato section; I never
noticed it before. I wonder if it is in the disk source, or occurred
during the audio/video sync processing.
I do NOT hear the deficiencies Don describes -- "serious problems of
breakup in loud passages, plus low-level hum and grinding noises" --
to the degree that he complains about; nor do I hear the pinched
quality criticized by DT in comparing his videotape copy with the ATS
LP (which admittedly I cannot do, no longer having the vinyl disk);
I wonder what the difference in perception is due to?
As a matter of fact, I was quit impressed with the splendid dynamic
range: the sudden outbursts that have been smoothed over in the
commercial release of '52, and the clarity of the choral sections in
the finale, where I hear almost NO distortion or sense of
constriction: obviously the disk source was made with incredible care,
and the disks were kept in immaculate condition. The "Turkish" music
at the very end of the Symphony is incredibly clean for a 1948
recording! No, I can't call this "bad", after hearing so many
butchered and botched RCA Victor releases that ruined Toscanini's
incomparable tonal balances and clarity.
So you have the inexplicable differences of opinion of 2 engineers. I
do not know what Don was using to audit his tape, but I was using my
standard AKG phones, from the output of my Nak preamp, driven by my
Sony K679ES cassette deck, playing my dub of the videotape HiFi track,
taken from my old Zenith VHS machine. I also listened at a variety of
levels on diverse speakers in my office and bedroom, but at moderate
audio levels since my wife is still teaching lessons in the other part
of our piano studio.
If Don is auditing on some incredible state-of-the-art professional
monitoring system in a recording studio, at accurate sound pressure
levels realistically reproducing the volume of the Ninth, then this
may explain the differences. But for me, the recording is NOT bad; it
is not even mediocre. It sounds better than MOST Toscanini
recordings, and is even somewhat more satisfying than some of the
later ones from the early fifties, when RCA used a bit too much peak
limiting, or mixed in too many mikes.
Rtsina
>soundtrack, or had one that was so deficient that they were forced to
>go to Seth Winner for the same source material that Clyde Key had
>used...thus began Winner's involvement with the BMG Toscanini project.
>Is this true?
>
I have no idea. Perhaps Mr. Winner will fill us in.
>I must say that if I listen to the linear audio tracks of the video
>cassette of the '48 Ninth, they are truly poor, compared to the HiFi
>tracks, where the high frequencies open up. Perhaps the comparison of
>videotape to LP record is fraught with many difficulties (the HiFi
>tracks on the VHS system DO use some companding, and maybe there're
>many slips 'twixt the cup and the lip...)
>
>I have the complete collection on laserdisc, and draw my conclusions from the
laser soundtrack. I don't mean to say that the BMG job is unlistenable; but it
lacks the impact and presence of Key's ATS lp issue. The moment I brought
home the laser and played it I had a sense of let-down. For the most part the
other items are very good. I can't compare the Wagner program with anything
other than an old cassette of the concert which is probably no better.
DT
>
>
>
>
Edward A. Cowan
> ...the 88th sounds like a dub I made from the
> shellacs many years ago, sans the noise I couldn't get rid of with my
> old analogue equipment. Again, if there is an elusive, unavailable
> source that is better for any of these recordings, I can live with
> that knowledge in light of the perfectly tolerable quality of these
> honest single-channel mono transfers.
A couple of nights ago, I compared the AT Haydn #88 (BMG/RCA Gold Seal)
with the ATS issue of Cantelli's of Jan.31, 1954 (in ATS-GC 1201/06).
Indeed, I, too, attempted a tape dub from the RCA-Victor 78s of #88,
with some success. This was, until the "Toscanini Edition," the only
means by which I was able to hear this performance. (I never saw or
heard the LP issue on LCT-7.) The BMG/RCA CD sounds good, as you
describe above. The Cantelli sounds amazingly fine (this was, after all,
1954 in Carnegie Hall, and not 1938 in Studio 8H!) Cantelli's tempi in
the 1st mvt. are more moderate than AT's fastish ones (too fast, IMHO),
and so the humor and the beauty of the music are better conveyed by
Cantelli than by AT. Cantelli's second movement may be a hair faster
than AT's, but not by much. The last two movements are also slightly
slower in tempo than with AT, but I find the two performances otherwise
similar.
Performances such as these two can easily spoil one for any others. The
only other recorded performance of Haydn #88 known to me that bears some
similarity to AT's is the old VPO set cond. Clemens Krauss. Krauss and
AT make slight hesitations at the start of each iteration of the rondo
theme in the last mvt. that I find attractive. Furtwängler, by
comparison, just jogs merrily along. A recording by Abendroth takes the
movement at breakneck speed...
--E.A.C.
Don Drewecki
AFT:
I listened to the 1948 Beethoven Ninth through the VHS HiFi tracks on a
Panasonic HiFi deck, through an NAD receiver and small B & W bookshelf
speakers. The soundtrack was just not good at all -- while the 1949
Aida telecast had excellent sound (with some telephone line clicks in a
few spots), and the 1948 Wagner had OK but not great sound. These are
the tapes that I bought in a local record store in 1991. I cannot
account for why you're hearing great sound off the Beethoven Ninth -- to
my ears, it's poor. Moreover, it wasn't done with the Johnston pickup,
but with THREE 44s at right angles to each other, pointing down -- if
you can believe that -- to the stage. And, if you look at the cassette
box, you'll see that the audio engineer was either Charles Gray or
George Mathes. Johnston left the NBC Symphony program in 1947.
Johnston's pickup was a single 44, aimed at the center axis of the
stage, and about three feet up and three feet behind AT. The front lobe
picked up the orchestra, the back lobe picked up the acoustics of the
hall.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Rtsina
>means by which I was able to hear this performance. (I never saw or
>heard the LP issue on LCT-7.)
I have both postwar 78s and LCT-7. Both sound alike---nasty.
DT
mike gray
>
> On 16 Dec 1998 21:46:09 GMT, rts...@aol.com (Rtsina) wrote:
> >I think the sound is BAD [video of 1948 Beethoven Ninth] in this case, compared to the outstanding high
> >fidelity broadcast preserved on my ATS disks of the 1948 9th. There's just no
> >comparison. The video is pinched and somewhat deficient in presence; and the
> >ATS disk is just stunning hi-fi. BMG screwed up.
>
> When I first got the video, I still had the ATS disk, and did not come
> to the same conclusion, but I take your word for it, as I no longer
> have the ATS set. Comparisons are no longer possible for me, but I
> defer to your modern experience, and discard my remembrance of the
> sound c.1990.
>
> soundtrack, or had one that was so deficient that they were forced to
> go to Seth Winner for the same source material that Clyde Key had
> used...thus began Winner's involvement with the BMG Toscanini project.
> Is this true?
>
> cassette of the '48 Ninth, they are truly poor, compared to the HiFi
> tracks, where the high frequencies open up. Perhaps the comparison of
> videotape to LP record is fraught with many difficulties (the HiFi
> tracks on the VHS system DO use some companding, and maybe there're
> many slips 'twixt the cup and the lip...)
>
>
>
> "Ignorance is bliss: use a killfile & add to it every day!"
> -- Corno di Bassetto
I believe (if I remember correctly) that the soundtrack to which the
Beethoven 9 is synchronized comes from HQ discs, not from tape. In
fact, there *was* a tape made (by RCA) of the audio feed of the Ninth,
but it was discarded years before anyone ever thought of matching it
with the kines.
Mike Gray
Don Drewecki
There is a 30-ips master tape of the 1949 Schumann Rhenish -- at least,
I think it has three of the five movements. BMG/RCA did not use that
tape for the Gold Seal remastering.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Rtsina
>There is a 30-ips master tape of the 1949 Schumann Rhenish -- at least,
>I think it has three of the five movements. BMG/RCA did not use that
>tape for the Gold Seal remastering.
>--
After recent postings about the 1949 Rhenish, I revisited my BMG CD. Not only
was the Rhenish strident and almost unlistenable, comparable to the
first-issued LM disk, but the three Weber overtures are inferior to their first
lp incarnation on "A Toscanini Omnibus" (1955). Only the Schumann Manfred
sounded well, though not as fine as my 1947-vintage 78rpm set of the overture.
Do you think the 30-ips master is playable. I've heard horror stories about
the condition of RCA's archives. For example, I understand the the 1953
Schubert 9th as recorded without the added echo, literally flaked to pieces
when the transfer engineers attempted to move it into the digital domain. Nice
going RCA.
DT
A. F. T.
>... Johnston left the NBC Symphony program in 1947.
My assumption that the Johnston position was used is corrected by Don
who apparently has the precise information; as an "outsider" my
impression -- based on comments in the Marsh books -- was that the
Johnston position was adopted sometime prior to the 1945 recording of
"American in Paris"to produce a more blended sound than the earliest
broadcasts, and was used up through the La Mer recording in 8H of
1950. If this is not the SPECIFIC case, then the correction is
appreciated. Nevertheless, it is sonically evident, judging from the
broadcasts of 1947-50, that a very consistent, similar mike
positioning was used for these programs: there is much more "air" and
room tone and bloom in these broadcasts than in earlier ones (such as
the 1942-3 Brahms cycle, or the 1939 Beethoven cycle.) I would also
guess that some major changes in mike positioning occurred between
1938 and '39: the programs of '37 and '38 are consistently tighter,
drier, and closer in detail, with less ambience, than the broadcasts
of '39 through '41 (one has only to compare the '38 Sibelius Second
with the '40 version for confirmation of this fact.) Could you
please, Don, elucidate the miking techniques, and the engineering
personnel, who were responsible for the broadcasts of those years?
>Johnston's pickup was a single 44, aimed at the center axis of the
>stage, and about three feet up and three feet behind AT. The front lobe
>picked up the orchestra, the back lobe picked up the acoustics of the
>hall.
A FANATICAL TOSCANINIPHILE
Don Drewecki
Some time around 1947 there was a book published entitled "Broadcasting
Music", written by Ernest LaPrade of NBC. There were quite a few photos
of NBC Symphony players, as I recall, and a diagram of the Johnston
position for a SINGLE RCA 44 bi-directional ribbon mike. That's at
three or four feet above/three or four feet behind the Maestro. The
problem is that you didn't get the extreme edges of the stage because
they were off-axis with the lobes of the mike (better condenser mikes
are made today in which you can go back several feet more to get those
edges in -- such as the Soundfield mike, a stereo mike which I use).
Anyway, as I've heard it, Robert Johnston MAY have left the orchestra
program in 1947 because he couldn't stand the smell of Don Gillis's
cigars -- but that's a guess of someone who told it to me years ago.
After 1947, what you see in publicity shots or the TV concerts is the
following:
In the 1948 Beethoven Ninth, you see THREE 44s used, the center one
placed perpendicularly to the ones on the left and right. Now, it is a
basic fact that if you sum the plus and minus lobes of mikes such as
these, you get PHASE CANCELLATIONS, otherwise known as comb-filtering.
That, for me, is one of the reasons why post-Johnston NBC sound is so
bad, and especially bass-deficient.
For the 1949 Aida, you see parallel 44s, separated by a few inches,
possibly to pick up the singers to the left and right of Maestro. That
is a better use of 44s than the perpendicular setup. And of course, we
don't know if all three mikes were summed in a mixer. But still not
perfect.
For Carnegie, you see one mike (which I can't tell in the TV concerts,
but assume is a 44) placed on a tall stand and pointed down near the
first flute and oboe. There is another mike at the stage apron, in
front of the first violins. And there appears to be another mike on a
stand in front of the brass -- all of which I've seen from the
telecasts. When you sum bidirectional mikes to mono, you get phase
cancellations, and the more mikes, the worse. That's my speculation on
why the NBC Symphony was so badly reproduced after 1947 -- they used
more mikes, one of which was right above the terrible first oboe, and
they summed it all into mono. Bad news. Very bad news.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
A. F. T.
>Some time around 1947 there was a book published entitled "Broadcasting
>Music", written by Ernest LaPrade of NBC. There were quite a few photos
>of NBC Symphony players, as I recall, and a diagram of the Johnston
>position for a SINGLE RCA 44 bi-directional ribbon mike.
Don's post is extremely interesting, and of great value to us
enthusiasts and sound engineers, but might tip the discussion over the
edge for other general music fans: apologies to you if he and I
digress a bit here!
It is interesting to recall Haggin on this topic: he wrote, "The
superb Debussy Iberia is evidence of the fact that excellent
recordings could be made in 8H when the producer -- in this case
Richard Mohr -- had the single microphone placed at what an NBC
engineer named Johnston had established as the optimum location, and
also -- as Johnston had further discovered to be necessary -- had the
seats in the hall pushed all the way back toward the wall. But for
Debussy's La Mer Mohr chose to place the microphone a few feet back
from the Johnston location and to push the seats only part of the way
back toward the wall; and the result was sound with less than the
presence and distinctness of Iberia's [this is hard for me to
corroborate by ear, judging from the generally excellent sound of both
readings in the fine Gold Seal transfer]. Worse still, at a 1945
session a producer named Richard Gilbert, after following Johnston's
directions and achieving a beautiful-sounding Gershwin An American in
Paris, decided, for the next piece, to place several microphones in a
way he had thought up, and achieved the shallow, coarse sound of the
Sousa Stars and Stripes Forever. [I shall have a lot more to say about
the differences of these recordings when I undertake to review the
Gold Seal transfers; the differences are also due to the horrible
amount of peak-limiting that flattened the Sousa, compared to the
relatively wide dynamic range of the Gershwin.]
Haggin goes on, to continue his diatribes against various RCA
personnel in changing mike placements and balances, finding one
session to be "beautiful and balanced" while another was "lusterless,
airless"...from our later vantage point, nearly thirty years after
Haggin published his critique, and a half-century after the originals
were transcribed, the differences may be a bit less discernible, as
ALL the recordings are "old" and share common sonic deficiencies of
one sort or another. Furthermore, many other characteristics of the
mastering, such as the settings of peak limiters, or the alteration in
tape dubs, the addition of artificial ambience, and re-equalization,
can have an effect equal to, or greater than, the precise choices of
mike placement. A fine original recording can be, and often was, so
badly distorted by reprocessing for various RCA Victor vinyl releases,
that often the relatively undoctored Gold Seal transfer seems "odd" to
the long-time collector who got used to his "enhanced" Red Seal LP
edition, with boosted bass, tizzy highs, and added echo.
>[the Johnston position was] at
>three or four feet above/three or four feet behind the Maestro. The
>problem is that you didn't get the extreme edges of the stage because
>they were off-axis with the lobes of the mike (better condenser mikes
>are made today in which you can go back several feet more to get those
>edges in -- such as the Soundfield mike, a stereo mike which I use).
Having owned and used two 44's (a TV-gray model and an earlier bright
chrome copy) I can testify to the limited pickup range that Don
mentions: the mike was extremely insensitive at the sides, with a
sharp lobe cutting off rapidly off-axis; and with a rather strange,
pinched tone in the rear lobe (caused, no doubt, by the presence of
mechanical obstructions behind the ribbon) compared to the relatively
flat and "sweet" response in front. Furthermore, like all ribbon
mikes, the 44 suffered from extreme sensitivity to low-frequency wind
noises, and dreadfully boosted the bass of live voices close to the
ribbon (the "proximity" effect.) The bass boost was of little
consequence at the distances used for the Toscanini orchestral pickup;
but we can hear the "ripe" quality of tone of the 44 when utilized for
the voice announcements of the NBC broadcasts and dramatic shows. In
fact, some radio and TV voice talents STILL demand a 44, because its
rich, ripe vocal enhancement is hard to duplicate precisely with an
equalizer!
I am continually surprised at the thin, tinny quality of the piano
sound in the Horowitz, Rubinstein, Hess, and D'Attili broadcasts of
the forties from 8H: considering the low-end prominence of the 44 mike
(and to a somewhat lesser extent, the 77), I wonder WHY the piano
sound is so flat? Were the engineers using a different type of
spotlight mike for the solo piano (or was the instrument incredibly
bad?)
>Now, it is a
>basic fact that if you sum the plus and minus lobes of mikes such as
>these, you get PHASE CANCELLATIONS, otherwise known as comb-filtering.
>That, for me, is one of the reasons why post-Johnston NBC sound is so
>bad, and especially bass-deficient.
I recall from using my own 44's that as one walked around the mike the
sound almost disappeared at the sides. At the edge of the lobes there
would certainly be an sensitivity loss due to the on-edge ribbon
failing to respond to sound waves that, in effect, travelled across
the narrow insensitive side; but the lobes were not created by any
sort of intrinsic phase-cancelling property. What the actual phase
character is at the side of a 44 I do not know; surely it was at least
somewhat nonlinear, so mixing a thin, weak side tone with a strong,
direct pickup would most likely result in some kind of phase loss.
What that actually is in practice, I do NOT know, having never done an
experiment. If the phase shift of the side pickup was not extreme,
but resulted from largely a sensitivity loss, causing merely a
low-amplitude, relatively phase linear signal output compared to the
front/back lobe maxima, then the phase shift or comb filtering would
be minimal and would not introduce a strange coloration of sound. So
Don is quite right in theory; but one has to duplicate the setup and
experiment with the actual relative pickup levels in a real acoustic
to determine if, in practice, this comb filtering occurs in a
deleterious manner with such an array of 44's.
>For the 1949 Aida, you see parallel 44s, separated by a few inches,
>possibly to pick up the singers to the left and right of Maestro. That
>is a better use of 44s than the perpendicular setup. And of course, we
>don't know if all three mikes were summed in a mixer. But still not
>perfect.
One also might ask if somehow the extra mikes were present as a
backup, feeding alternative mike preamps. Back in those vacuum-tube
days, when it was necessary to use 60 dB gain circuits for the
low-output ribbon mikes, the sensitive pentode amplifiers were prone
to noise (and the tubes had to be suspended on rubber isolators, and
operated from heavily-filtered power rails); often, a mike preamp tube
would develop a slight cathode-to-grid short and begin to hum at the
most embarrassing moment, or a resistor would start crackling. One
wonders if at least SOME of the extra equipment was provided so that a
rapid switchover could be achieved to maintain a continual broadcast
in the eventuality of a breakdown. Of course, then it would have been
more reasonable to place the mikes along the same plane and directed
the same way, than arrayed at right angles. We do know that for at
least SOME of the NBC Symphony programs, alternative mikes and a
completely separate sound mix was used for Spanish-language shortwave
transmission. The Gardner collection, utilized by Richard Caniell for
the Naxos Toscanini Concert series, contains alternate transcription
sources with complete hall tone and lengthy applause, all the way
through to the end of many of the pieces until one hears empty room
tone, while other transcriptions of the same broadcasts (taken from
NBC network lines) have the applause crossfaded to the live announcer;
were these different acetates made with the identical set of mikes,
merely mixed differently, or were they employing similar, nearby mikes
driving separate chains?
One does understand that the Toscanini Society once prepared a stereo
transfer of alternative transcriptions of the 1942 live broadcast of
the Copland El Salon Mexico: it is in REAL stereo, not optimal of
course, but derived from separate mikes, spaced sufficiently so that
intensity and phase differences could replicate something of the
original soundstaging in at least a partial binaural or stereo
proscenium.
>When you sum bidirectional mikes to mono, you get phase
>cancellations, and the more mikes, the worse. That's my speculation on
>why the NBC Symphony was so badly reproduced after 1947 -- they used
>more mikes, one of which was right above the terrible first oboe, and
>they summed it all into mono. Bad news. Very bad news.
Don is an expert live concert recording engineer, who uses state of
the art equipment. I, too, have done at least a modest amount of live
classical music recording, of a lesser achievement and with old
analogue gear (and have produced one commercial LP release); we differ
about this. I personally do not think that "the NBC Symphony was so
badly reproduced after 1947"; judging from virtually all of the Clyde
Key/ATS issues taken from airchecks, some of them being amazingly
transparent, and a wide assortment of other transfers from Music &
Arts, from collector's tapes, and from very high quality early home
tape copies made by people I have met and talked to, or corresponded
with, as well as some of the few live authorized performance
broadcasts from '48 through '54 that have augmented the commercial
Toscanini Victor recordings, I find that many, if not most, of the
recorded artifacts are perfectly satisfactory, and are musically
enriching.
For example, the 1948 Brahms performances are very fine indeed: the
Gold Seal of the Double Concerto is powerful and transparent, and
lacks the horrid thin coloration of the old Red Seal vinyl release
(and the video transfer has good sound, too, that seems to be nearly
identical except for a moment or two); the Stradivari issue of the
Horowitz reading of the Brahms Second Concerto from Nov. of '48 is
amazingly fine; one could go on and on with other examples. I have
heard virtually all the broadcasts from '45 through the end of the
Toscanini career, and can really fault ONLY some of the Carnegie Hall
balances (such as the over-close Debussy and Franck of '52, or the
thin, colorless Beethoven Fourth of '51.) I just cannot fathom how or
where Don draws the line between "good" and "bad", or "better" and
"worse" in these Toscanini productions. They are on a continuum, with
characteristics varying all over the map; each may have some distinct
flaw, compensated by another outstanding virtue; the contents and
proportions of these vary over a certain expectable and definable
range.
And, if we put, say, the Furtwaengler recordings under such a
microscope, no one would ever again be content to buy and listen to
one for satisfaction and soul-enrichment. The categorical derision of
a huge body of Toscanini recordings and broadcasts is not something
that the general music lover and collector would want to do, in lieu
of experiencing their virtues of detail and spiritual communication.
We seem to have four distinct bodies of Toscanini commentators: the
haters (like Brian Hunt of ClassicCD magazine, who wrote a
"Reputations" column ridiculing Toscanini that ONE HUNDRED PERCENT of
respondents disagreed with); the idolaters, who look past any defects
of transmission or flaws of interpretation, to value Toscanini above
ALL other musicians, even when he conducts Thomas or Tommassini; the
harsh, unforgiving polemicists (like Haggin, who apply a
fundamentalist, un-challengeable, and Cassandra-like judgment and
condemnation of those issues they disapprove of, and of work that they
judge to be inadequate, inferior, and unworthy); and the pragmatists,
who have open minds, open ears, and are willing to put the human flaws
of music, performance, and technology in perspective. I would hope to
be in the last camp.
Don Drewecki
AFT:
I take the purist approach, because that's what separates the "men from
the boys" in terms of how to balance an orchestra. Maybe once in a
while a spot mike will bring out some important details, but generally I
want to hear recordings that are recordings, rather than highly altered
reconstructions.
This may go beyond many readers' interests, but make this comparison, if
you can:
The November 1945 Glinka Jota Aragonesa (issued by the ATS on LP in
superb sound)
and
the March 1950 Jota (issued by BMG on the Gold Seal series).
The former is the Johnston pickup -- the sound is clear and present,
while the later one sounds "liver", yes, but also washed out when the
orchestra plays softly, and you hear less detail. The later performance
has a lot less presence than the earlier. You also hear less fullness
in the lower strings than in the earlier broadcast. You have every right
to prefer the later one; but I think the earlier has greater "punch" and
impact than the 1950. yeah, the later has a greater frequency range,
possibly due to being a tape master, but in every other aspect the 1945
version is better to my ears. The person who really stressed this
difference to me, years ago, was Robert Hupka, who attended numerous
rehearsals and concerts and feels the Johnston pickup did AT greatest
justice.
--
Don Drewecki
<dre...@rpi.edu>
Alrod
wrote:
>So, don't imagine for a moment that pitch problems are limited only to
>modern CD transfers!
Oh, I never imagined any such thing. I'd just like to point out that
throughout the LP era, variable speed turntables were always readily
available, and from major manufacturers.
However, variable speed CD players have always been hard to find.
Manufacturers with audiophile pretensions like Denon and Sony made
individual models with pitch variation a while back, but no longer.
Now the only ones available are made for the dance club-DJ market or
as part of karaoke players.
Since a direct digital output will go mute when the player's speed is
less than perfect, at all other pitches you are at the mercy of the
digital-to-analog converters included in the CD player, and I have no
reason to believe Gemini and its brethren spend much money on the
electronics inside their disco-hiphop-What I Did For Love machines.
About RCA:
There has been considerable dispute about what appears to be a company
tradition of monkeying with the speed. The immortal Bjoerling/Cellini
Trovatore is about a 1/4 tone sharp on CD, and there was fierce
brawling about the proper speed for the Vickers/Serafin Otello. In
fact, back in the LP days, the RCA and Decca/London editions of the
Price/Solti Aida were at different speeds, the RCA higher.
About Jack Pfeiffer:
I disagree often with Don about what seems to me an absolutist
recording philosophy, but I do agree with him that when time and money
got short, Pfeiffer could cut corners and not talk about it. A
considerable part of RCA's 14-CD Complete Caruso, ballyhooed as going
direct from 78 to Soundstream, was actually derived from analog tapes
produced for LP transfer 15 years earlier. So as a matter of policy,
whenever this company announces that it's going back to the Ur-Source,
I break out a barrel of salt.
About RCA tape masters:
And as far as tape disintegration is concerned, it's good to remember
that RCA had its own brand of tape, and promoted its recordings as
being made on their proprietary brand. Unfortunately, RCA tape
overloaded during recording and fell apart in storage a bit more
readily than some of the name brand competition.
Alrod
Rtsina
>And as far as tape disintegration is concerned, it's good to remember
>that RCA had its own brand of tape, and promoted its recordings as
>being made on their proprietary brand. Unfortunately, RCA tape
>overloaded during recording and fell apart in storage a bit more
>readily than some of the name brand competition.
>
Ampex 20/20+.
DT
>
>
>
>
>
>
A. F. T.
>About RCA:
>There has been considerable dispute about what appears to be a company
>tradition of monkeying with the speed.
I wasn't aware of the systematic problem of this, having not done
careful comparisons and not being 'blessed' with incredibly accurate
absolute pitch sense (though I am sensitive to wow and can hear very
close discrepancies if I A-B different pitches)...I recently used my
adjustable Technics SLD202 table, which my wife purchased years ago to
use with her Music Minus One records, to compare the transfer of the
old LCT edition of the Rachmaninoff Second Concerto by R. himself with
the PO under Stokowski, with the Biddulph transfer by MO-T. The pitch
of the Biddulph agreed with my modern CD analogue sourced and
all-digital versions. However, the pitch of the LCT was nearly a
semitone sharp (and I made sure the Technics was precisely at 33.3
with the strobe); the effect of the LCT was to musically alter the
actual impact of the work, and the performance, making them both seem
somehow "brighter" and livelier in character. I have no idea how the
45 RPM transfer sounded, and did not have my old 3-disk Victor Red
Seal set of the late fifties to see how it was done, but -- indeed --
the LCT was sharp. Have any other readers noticed if there is a
consistent tendency of speed errors in those early-fifties Victor LP
releases?
>About Jack Pfeiffer:
>...Pfeiffer could cut corners and not talk about it. A
>considerable part of RCA's 14-CD Complete Caruso, ballyhooed as going
>direct from 78 to Soundstream, was actually derived from analog tapes
>produced for LP transfer 15 years earlier. So as a matter of policy,
>whenever this company announces that it's going back to the Ur-Source,
>I break out a barrel of salt.
I wouldn't mind a bit of subject creep here: since you mention the
Caruso set, I would be interested in your opinion. I have not managed
to go all the way through mine yet, but I did notice that the segment
that includes the popular recordings that were included in a seventies
Victor LP that encompassed "Over There" seem to be done from the SAME
exact tape. When I got that Victor LP when it was first released (I
THINK that it was not credited to Stockham), I noticed that the
transfer engineers had run the signal through heavy peak limiting (!)
so that there were NO dynamics at all...the original Victor shellac
acousticals were in my grandfather's record library and I had played
them over and over again for 20 years before that LP was issued, and
knew what they sounded like. On both the LP (and the BMG Caruso set)
those particular recordings in the c.1915-17 era were squashed, and
had their tonality so falsified that they scarcely resembled either
anything REAL in sound, or anything like the original disks.
Of course, one notes that Thomas Stockham himself stated that he
intended to change the tonality of the acousticals, to "compensate"
for the horn resonances and reduce spurious frequency peaks.
But I never felt that the Soundstream re-equalization was particularly
effective or realistic. I think that Stockham managed to enrich the
lower midrange but otherwise eliminated the silvery clarity and
soaring power of Caruso's voice. And I suspect that part of his
technique was to employ peak limiting to smooth out the passages that
he felt were "blasting" on the original acousticals: the places where
the voice seems to jump out in dynamic contrast. Some of this MAY
indeed have been caused by the sympathetic resonances of the horn
system at certain frequencies, but some was surely the natural musical
dynamics of Caruso's projection; yet Stockham just smoothed all into a
steady din.
And that seventies' "Over There" Red Seal album, as well as the BMG
Caruso set replication, was among the worst examples of this
technique.
>About RCA tape masters:
>And as far as tape disintegration is concerned, it's good to remember
>that RCA had its own brand of tape, and promoted its recordings as
>being made on their proprietary brand.
And RCA made its own horrible, clumsily-designed, unreliable tape
recorders, too: the RT series. I had to maintain them; they were
poorly conceived, fussy, hard to align, and impossible to keep working
steadily and reliably. When one looks at any of the pictures of the
RCA recording studios, what do we see: RT-11s? No. Ampex 300's and 350
series mono and stereo machines.
mike gray
>
> On Wed, 16 Dec 1998 21:42:19 GMT, NoE...@AnyOldPlace.Arg (A. F. T.)
> wrote:
>
> >modern CD transfers!
>
> throughout the LP era, variable speed turntables were always readily
> available, and from major manufacturers.
>
> However, variable speed CD players have always been hard to find.
> Manufacturers with audiophile pretensions like Denon and Sony made
> individual models with pitch variation a while back, but no longer.
> Now the only ones available are made for the dance club-DJ market or
> as part of karaoke players.
>
> Since a direct digital output will go mute when the player's speed is
> less than perfect, at all other pitches you are at the mercy of the
> digital-to-analog converters included in the CD player, and I have no
> reason to believe Gemini and its brethren spend much money on the
> electronics inside their disco-hiphop-What I Did For Love machines.
>
> There has been considerable dispute about what appears to be a company
> Trovatore is about a 1/4 tone sharp on CD, and there was fierce
> brawling about the proper speed for the Vickers/Serafin Otello. In
> fact, back in the LP days, the RCA and Decca/London editions of the
> Price/Solti Aida were at different speeds, the RCA higher.
>
> About Jack Pfeiffer:
> I disagree often with Don about what seems to me an absolutist
> recording philosophy, but I do agree with him that when time and money
> considerable part of RCA's 14-CD Complete Caruso, ballyhooed as going
> direct from 78 to Soundstream, was actually derived from analog tapes
> produced for LP transfer 15 years earlier. So as a matter of policy,
> whenever this company announces that it's going back to the Ur-Source,
> I break out a barrel of salt.
>
> And as far as tape disintegration is concerned, it's good to remember
> that RCA had its own brand of tape, and promoted its recordings as
> overloaded during recording and fell apart in storage a bit more
> readily than some of the name brand competition.
>
And as a result, RCA used Audiotape and Scotch, like other intelligent
record companies. In fact, I'm not sure RCA tape was produced in 1/2
widths for three-track mastering. At least, I've never seen any in the
tape vaults I've visited.
Mike Gray
Alrod
wrote:
>> About RCA tape masters:
>> And as far as tape disintegration is concerned, it's good to remember
>> that RCA had its own brand of tape, and promoted its recordings as
>> being made on their proprietary brand. Unfortunately, RCA tape
>> overloaded during recording and fell apart in storage a bit more
>> readily than some of the name brand competition.
>>
>> Alrod
>
>And as a result, RCA used Audiotape and Scotch, like other intelligent
>record companies. In fact, I'm not sure RCA tape was produced in 1/2
>widths for three-track mastering. At least, I've never seen any in the
>tape vaults I've visited.
>
>Mike Gray
You may be right. They may have been blowing smoke, but I do remember
releases advertised as having been recorded on RCA Tape. And I do
recall hearing complaints that some of their master tapes dried out
early. And the overload, such as on the Leinsdorf Verdi Macbeth, is
hard to explain otherwise.
Alrod
mike gray
Thanks for the response - let me ask one of my buddies in BMG for a
better read on this. But you are right - RCA tape was inferior to Scotch
and Audiotape, which is why RCA engineers avoided it.
Mike Gray