HCO was the first Hollywood prefix for CBS era Columbia masters (with H on CBS Okeh records), replacing ARC's LA prefix started on Brunswick in the 1930s. RHCO were later masters recorded at Radio Recorders. (Notwithstanding there are many HCO masters that were recorded there as well.) CO is New York; CCO is Chicago. The X actually started with Brunswick from when they started making lateral-cut records, to denote 12" masters. When ARC acquired Brunswick B indicated a 10" master, XB a 12". ARC carried over the practice of X denoting 12" masters on domestic Columbia recordings after they acquired it in 1934, dispensing with Columbia's earlier practice of having different numerical series for given categories of records in addition to those for different sizes of record. 10" LPs were prefixed LP or FLP, and again the X denoted 12 inch records (but there's no XFLP I've ever seen). Not so sure about JCO for Playtime....that was the children's label started by ARC in the 1930s, originally on 7 inch records, first shellac, later vinyl. Am speculating here, but I'd guess the switch to a smaller 6" red styrene disc came at the time Columbia intruduced styrene 45s.
Hi Everyone, A lot has been going on in the world of 30th St interest, but it's time to do some pictures first. This is a remote session, and it seems possible the pictures are from two differing parts of the same event. The negatives were all together. This first one shows Leonard Bernstein, I think, conducting an orchestra with some kind of raised section in the back. Anyone recognize where this is? Guessing it's in Manhattan. This is clearly a rehearsal as they are all in their civvies. Here's a closer view. Looks like a jazz combo up on a pretty tall riser. Here's a view of them from the side. Anyone recognize anybody? Look at the guy at the extreme lower left of the above picture Hey, it's Teo! Is he the sub-conductor for the jazz group that's part of this larger work? Or is he just there for the rehearsal? What work could this be? Fortunately, Fred, in his interest in the sheet music as part of the story, whether as explanation or joke, leaves us a clue: I think the player (clarinet?) added the prefix, since it seems to be in a different hand than the title. None of the Google terms I can think of results in anything telling what or when or where this event was; anyone have any ideas? These pictures are from MSS 52, The Frederick and Rose Plaut Papers in the Irving S. Gilmore Music Library of Yale University, gathered with the help of Richard Boursey and Emily Ferrigno, wonderful librarians.
Back to Fo30st (Friends of 30th Street Studio) news: I'll be in New York in a few weeks and am looking forward to seeing people and sharing our finds. There will be a gathering of the Fo30St group at some point, and when we get a date I will post it here so you can tell me if you can be there. That way we'll have enough seats. My enforced days with time to do tedious work resulted in a lot of transcribing the AFM sheet information that I gathered on my last NY trip into a spreadsheet. It's over 800 separate sessions now, and I'm in the middle of August 1953. There are enough entries and studio activity has progressed so that it's possible to see use patterns, which is one of the things I was hoping to see from this project. They had lots of stuff happening, and I look forward to sharing some of that with you as time permits, which is not much this time of year. We've also been given permission to do more work in the Sony/CBS/CRI archives while I'm there, and to bring people to help. As I mentioned earlier, one of the things I want to accomplish with this project is to determine exactly which sessions were in which studio, since the AFM reports don't start routinely specifying studios until November 1954 (although I found a couple of mentions as asides that a session took place in 30th St , so that was fun to find). If you have been a participant in this thread before now (so I kind of know you) and want to be part of that research, which would involve spending at least a morning or afternoon with me in the archives, let me know and we will figure out a schedule. The days open to us are some subset of April 3-7 and 10-14. You need to present ID and so forth and be approved to get in. That's it for now. Thanks for reading.
That's Carnegie Hall: The curtains and drop ceiling likely would help nail down the timeframe. Note Teo is visible sitting in the orchestra in the second and third photos.
Looks like the ceiling panel was in place from 1946 to 1986: "The stage, for example, has been restored to its full height, and the unsightly curtain and hanging panels that filled the upper half of it since 1946 have been removed. Now the proscenium arch opens to the original gently bowed stage ceiling, from which is hung the one new element in the auditorium, a discreet, curving beam structure that contains lighting." CARNEGIE'S ALLEGRO FACELIFT: PAST LIVES Not sure about the curtains.
Teo apparently started at Columbia in 1957, but based on both the look of the photos and Teo's position, my feeling is this is earlier. This bit from Wiki seems relevant: "In 1953, Macero co-founded Charles Mingus' Jazz Composers Workshop, and became a major contributor to the New York City avant-garde jazz scene. As a composer, Macero wrote in an atonal style, as well as in third stream, a synthesis of jazz and classical music. He performed live, and recorded several albums with Mingus and the other Workshop members over the next three years, including Jazzical Moods (in 1954) and Jazz Composers Workshop (in 1955). During this time, Macero also recorded Explorations (DLP-6). While he had contributed compositions to other albums, this was the first full album of his own compositions, and Macero's first album as a leader. Macero plays tenor and alto saxophones on the album, and is joined by Orlando DiGirolamo on accordion, both Mingus and Lou Labella on basses, and Ed Shaughnessy on drums. Explorations was originally released in 1954 on Mingus' Debut Records, and was reissued on CD in 2006 on Fresh Sounds Records, with additional tracks." Teo Macero - Wikipedia I've been having a hard time finding entries on AMG and Discogs. There are certain releases, but not one that seems to fit this. Randomly, here's a completely unrelated photo I found from 30th Street while searching for other things: "Philly Joe" Jones.
I was thinking that this is probably a third stream concert, given the time and the people in the photo. It wouldn't surprise me if Gunther Schuller was involved. But a quick internet search didn't reveal anything
Carnegie Hall, New York Philharmonic, Leonard Bernstein. Rehearsal for Teo Macero's composition Fusion (15 min) with jazz quintet: Art Farmer trumpet, John La Porta sax, Don Butterfield tuba, Wendell Marshall bass, Ed Shaughnessy drums. Premiered on 11 January 1958. Seems it was not recorded.
WOW, this is great. Thanks to you, Luke, and crispi for figuring this out. My buddy Gary Louie who reads this thread but has not registered to post, found some more information before seeing your post: "My music reading is terrible, but it looks to me that the photo of Con-Fusion score is a 1st clarinet part for Teo's composition, "Fusion." A little Googling seems to indicate that he eventually released an album (1985) of that title including the piece, about 16 minutes long. You can hear his recording with the London Phil on YouTube ( ) and it sounds plausibly that it's an orchestra and "jazz Combo" although I can't follow the 1st clarinet part well enough to see if the recording matches the score photo. The LPO recording has some weird sounds that could be electric guitar. Compositions tend to change over time. Further Googling shows that Teo had the piece performed by the NY Phil in 1958: The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz which is a scan of a book called "The Biographical Encyclopedia of Jazz" edited by the late Leonard Feather, Ira Gitler. It's the entry on Teo. In your photos, maybe Teo is listening to the raised combo, or conducting them. He's also in the other photos, always facing to the side. Further, you can go to the NY Phil website and look up every performance and program: New York Philharmonic | Performance History Simple, they played it 1/11/1958 and 1/12/58, conducted by Bernstein at Carnegie Hall. Soloists: Art Farmer, trumpet John LaPorta, alto sax and clarinet Don Butterfield, tuba Wendell Marshall, contrabass Ed Shaughnessy, percussion (drums) It's funny to see Shaughnessy without his later muttonchop sideburns from the Tonight Show years. Of course, who knows when the rehearsal photos were taken."
Do you have any more info about this picture? It's curious, because the mic stand and baffle are completely unlike anything I've seen before in 3oth St, although there was indeed plumbing pipe used to hold that stereo mic pair in the pic I earlier posted. That baffle looks laced together, though.... Any ideas when this was taken? Or what mic that is? The heat vent and floorboards look right.
Here's another picture from that session, you can see Philly Joe Jones (his jacket on the chair behind him) and the same setup in the background: Looks like the 1957 Milestones session, but it could be earlier from 1955/56 from the Round About Midnight session. I'll have to check my Miles booklets. The photo is from this article: Miles Davis ‘Round Midnight’ | Classic Tracks |
Not sure about the mic, Dan. It looks like some sort of early dynamic, but not one that's familiar to me.
That's a nice article and interview with Frank Laico, and description of the studio. It should be in the first post of this thread, even though some of what he says has to be questionable at least, particularly Mitch Miller's initial importance to the selection of the 30th St Studio building. We've learned a lot in this thread. Regarding this picture, I've always loved it because of the look on Red Garland's face when Miles is teaching him how to play the piano. I think it was in Ashley Kahn's "Kind of Blue" where he talks about Red finally getting fed up with Miles doing that and quitting, and this look sums up that feeling for me. Thanks for the link and reminder of that article. Still, it's funny about that lace-up baffle. Do we agree that we are looking at the SW main entry door to the studio, and see a tiny glimpse of the old control room carbuncle sticking out into the room on the right? And the vent on the left is in the plane of the wall that the new control room window was later in? That seems like a very odd place to put the band, tight against that big vent with what must be a big metal duct behind it. If it is indeed Round Midnight, according to the article that was September 1955 (before the diffusers were removed) and June and October 1956, after they were gone. That shot is just missing where the diffusers would have been, although there are curtains visible in both places. Pausing to look at pictures, when the diffusers were there, there were no curtains, so this was after the removal of the diffusers and so after March 1956. Going to have to keep my eyes open for lace-up baffles.
Yes. The door to the new control room would eventually be just about behind where Miles is standing. Immediately to the left of the air vent.
I know that we shouldn't interpret too much into photographs as they are deceiving (facial expressions can be elusive) but when seeing this picture I always have to think of how Red Garland got fed up with Miles and walked out during the Milestones sessions. So Miles ended up playing both trumpet and piano on the track Sid's Ahead. If you listen closely, you notice that they never play at the same time and that the chords are much more impressionistic and abstract sounding than what Red would have played. By the way, Milestones was recorded in 1958 and not 1957 as I initially said. We still don't know when this picture was taken and even though said article discusses the Round About Midnight album, that doesn't mean the picture is from those sessions. Another thing that caught my attention is the fact that Miles appears to be holding a fluegelhorn, not a trumpet, between his legs. I thought that maybe this was one of the Gil Evans big band sessions, where he would play the fluegelhorn. That would maybe explain why the band was crammed in a corner like that. But then again, even though both Philly Joe Jones and Paul Chambers did appear on those big band records, Red Garland did not.
There's a picture of part of the group in the Porgy and Bess CD booklet which shows Gil and Miles kind of out in the middle of the room, seemingly, and the group in a big U shape, with the closed end of the U toward the old control room. You can only see the ends of the U, so there's inference involved. The video that is in a TV studio with that band playing "So What" clearly shows how the U was set up, and I infer that the studio sessions were set up in a similar way. So not backed up to the wall. There's a link to this video somewhere in this thread. It's wonderful to see.
This is a version of that So What video, and says it's the official video for the song: Edit: Shoot, that isn't the video I thought it was and doesn't show the layout in a big U. Quickly looked and can't find the right one. Any ideas? I'm sure I saw a video of a contemporary movie showing the band with bass clarinet and/or bassoon that was on that P&B session, but this isn't it. Maybe it was a later part of that TV session? Edit 2: OK, a version of the U is in this video of the "Kind Of Blue" movie "Kind Of Blue" - Miles Davis - Documentary 1/3 starting around 6:30. Miles is not in the same place as in the P&B picture, though. FWIW.
HCO and RHCO signified Hollywood, the difference being the added 'R' indicated recording at the Radio Recorders Annex on Sycamore Avenue (in effect from fall 1949 until 1961 when they reverted to HCO upon the opening of Columbia's own Hollywood studio on Columbia Square). The 'J' in JCO indicated a 6" size. 'X' was 12", 'Z' was 7" - and 'Y', 16". By definition, they (and XCO) would have been cut in New York. But by the 1950's, CO prefices, besides the recordings at 799 Seventh and 30th Street, were also used for recordings made at Jim Beck studios in Dallas, TX, and then in Nashville. So many recordings were made at Nashville that by 1963, a new numbering system, with an 'NCO' prefix, was created. Alas, this was after the 78 was discontinued, and such numbers were only applied to the master tapes for each track. You probably forgot 'CCO' for Chicago. 'XLP' was 12" - 33⅓ RPM. ('LP' was for 10" speed, ZLP 7".) The stereo equivalent was XSM on 12" LP's. And on Columbia and Date; for Epic and later OKeh, the matrix prefices for LP's were XEM for mono and XSB for stereo.
Thanks for this, W.B. Want to come with me to the Sony archives to look around in a month or so? Better yet, I'll go with you.
Please P.M. me when you're ready. I haven't been there in 20 years. One person I dealt with has long since retired, the other dead. They got all new people there now - new to me, that is.
Just one picture today. Came across this capture from the Glenn Gould "On The Record" movie, and decided to try lightening it up and bringing out the shadows. It really gives a nice view of how many curtains there were in that space at this particular moment in time, as well as an indication of what a beautiful soaring space it was. When the original cast recording of "Company" was filmed in 30th St., DA Pennebaker talks in the DVD extras about how they replaced all the lamps in the overhead lights with super bright but short-lived photography bulbs*; I'd wonder if that happened here, too, except there are shots of the Gould film crew setting up and using studio lights and not the overhead lights. My guess is that one of the bulbs burned out and it was an interesting visual for the movie. There's another shot in that OTR movie looking way down on the overhead lights, so they were already thinking and using ladders/scaffold for their shots. * There was another dramatic element described in the DVD extras where the session went so long that the bulbs started dying with huge POPS, and they were not only racing to get Elaine Strich's solo recorded but also doing it before the lamps all died. And they didn't have any spares IIRC. Edit: Extra points if you can identify the man on the ladder.
A bit better quality: And here's that high shot: My best guess is the camera is suspended from a rope or something. The ladder wasn't anywhere near tall enough. There's the question of how they got any ropes up there though. Does anyone know about the bulbs Pennebaker was talking about? I did a bit of searching a while back and couldn't find anything. I'm not familiar with what he was talking about.
Nice, thanks! I think they were on a scaffold for that second shot. There is a shot of the studio wall somewhere that shows all the ladders, some of which are pretty big, and a really tall scaffold. (Looking, looking looking...) Here it is. This is a funky version of it, I've seen much better versions, but this is the one I have right now: Way on the right you can see a ginormous scaffold going up up up. I think this is the picture that has been called the last picture taken at 30th St, but I have no confirmation of that or remember who called it that. That Gould OTR crew was into high angle shots. Remember the beginning when Gould is entering the studio from the cab? In fact, it's the shot in my avatar. It's looking almost straight down at him as he steps up onto the sidewalk and then follows him as he approaches the door. The only way I can figure they did that was to have a ladder or a ladder on the bed of a flatbed truck. Or a scaffold. So it wouldn't surprise if they used a scaffold inside the building, and there was definitely one there at least when one picture was taken. Regarding the bulbs, it was common for photographers to use bulbs at normal wall outlet voltage which were designed for a lower voltage. They burn out quicker that way but give a REAL BRIGHT LIGHT while they last that is a cooler temperature (more blue) than when used at design voltage. That blue light is closer to daylight than regular incandescent lamps. I have no idea of a part number or what their design voltage was, though.
