Steve, when did the major labels begin recording in stereo?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by theoxrox, May 30, 2013.

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  1. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    Some of the early Atlantic stereo is really terrible. I'm thinking specifically of the MJQ's "Fontessa," which sounds like the recording equipment was across the river in New Jersey - plus there's a ground hum! I'm assuming that Atlantic was still recording inside their office, after hours.
     
    action pact, May 30, 2013
    #26
  2. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Yeah, they had a portable stereo machine that they tried to use, dreadful.
     
    Steve Hoffman, May 30, 2013
    #27
  3. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    Isn't it interesting that Rudy Van Gelder was doing stereo sessions for Blue Note as early as March 1957? AFAIK there were no Blue Note reel to reels ever commercially released. Did Blue Note start pressing stereo LPs in 1958 like the majors or was it later?
     
    action pact, May 30, 2013
    #28
  4. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    But note that his sessions for Prestige were mono only (bounced from two track, usually). Bob W. didn't want to pay the extra 40 bucks..
     
    Steve Hoffman, May 30, 2013
    #29
  5. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    That doesn't surprise me! Did Rudy tape over the 2 tracks, or do they still exist?
     
    action pact, May 30, 2013
    #30
  6. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Well, they don't, sorry to say. I'm very sure SAXOPHONE COLOSSUS was done in stereo, edited and then bounced (mixed) to mono because the tape has edits but no splices. Not sure why he did it that way, actually.
     
    Steve Hoffman, May 30, 2013
    #31
  7. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    Well, that's a shame, I guess. That probably means no outtakes either.

    I was also wondering why he would run the stereo machine for a customer that was only paying for mono. Who knows, maybe the mono machine was acting up or something.
     
    action pact, May 30, 2013
    #32
  8. theoxrox

    theoxrox Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
    central Wisconsin
    Just wanted to thank everyone who has contributed to this thread for the info, and a special thanks to our Fearless Leader Steve for making a couple of appearances.
     
    theoxrox, May 30, 2013
    #33
    Steve Hoffman likes this.
  9. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    I think Rudy sensed this was an important album and did the work part to two track so he could actually mix to mono like the big boys were doing. Or, he recorded in mono, edited the thing up and then bounced to another mono tape to get extra echo, compression and to lose the many edits. He did that a bunch. Didn't like to cut records from edited tapes for some reason. Wacky stuff.
     
    Steve Hoffman, May 30, 2013
    #34
  10. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    Ah, I see. Thanks as always for the neat insider info!
     
    action pact, May 30, 2013
    #35
  11. Bas Mollenkramer

    Bas Mollenkramer Hyperactive!

    Location:
    Amersfoort, the Netherlands
    I have many different mono and stereo pressings of this album both on CD and LP. ALL stereo versions are marred by bad tape hiss and atrocious hum. I bought a Japanese stereo CD reissue, hoping that perhaps someone had finally found other masters, but the problems were the same.

    It's relatively easy using Adobe Audition to remove the hum totally. It's there at 60 Hz, plus its harmonics at 120 Hz and 180 Hz. If you remove these with sharp FFT filters the recording becomes HUGELY more enjoyable despite the hiss.

    The tape hiss is harder to address. If you remove it a little, the sound of the music isn't damaged too much and again the listenability increases a lot.

    THE BEAUTY of this recording is the stereo sound stage. Once you have done all the above, a stereo image remains with real depth and width. You can tell where everybody is standing and how far away from the microphones. It's gorgeous!!

    So, I am waiting for someone to restore this recording professionally. If anyone wanted to tackle it, I'd be happy to provide a few pointers if it helps.

    By the way, on the mono and stereo versions, the second track on side two is a different take!!
     
    Bas Mollenkramer, Jul 22, 2013
    #36
  12. action pact

    action pact Music Omnivore

    Location:
    Lexington, Massachusetts
    Ron McMaster cleaned it up for the recent Mosaic box set. The mono masters were used for the 'main' versions, with the alternate stereo masters included on the bonus disc.
     
    action pact, Jul 22, 2013
    #37
  13. nikh33

    nikh33 Senior Member

    Location:
    Liverpool, England
    This is probably a threadcrap, but in terms of BROADCASTING, when was stereo first used? A November 1927 issue of 'Radio times' reports a live OB of a play or concert heard over headphones at home and somebody "heard walking across the stage from left to right from one ear to the other". Howcum?
     
    nikh33, Jul 22, 2013
    #38
  14. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    If you mean actual, true "multiplex" broadcasting, that would be 1961 in this country. If you mean one channel broadcast on your AM radio and the other channel broadcast on your FM radio, that's much earlier, 1958 or so I guess, not sure.
     
    Steve Hoffman, Jul 22, 2013
    #39
  15. Rackmacko

    Rackmacko Active Member

    Some deal where they broadcast over two separate frequencies. That listener would have needed two radio sets with an earphone plugged into each.
     
    Rackmacko, Jul 22, 2013
    #40
  16. seed_drill

    seed_drill Senior Member

    Location:
    Tryon, NC, USA
    Wasn't some of the stuff recorded on two and three track systems but originally issued only in mono later remixed for stereo releases?
     
    seed_drill, Jul 22, 2013
    #41
  17. seed_drill

    seed_drill Senior Member

    Location:
    Tryon, NC, USA
    During the intermediate period Steve was talking about, they had tuners that allowed playback on AM and FM simultaneously for stereo playback. My H.H. Scott tuner has an add on exterior multiplexer to enable it to decode "modern" stereo broadcasts.
     
    seed_drill, Jul 22, 2013
    #42
  18. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Well, yeah, but not much. Most everything recorded in "binaural" was issued on reel to reel. A few things were saved in the can in stereo or three channel but until the 1958 "conversion" of the majors, not much that wasn't issued right away.
     
    Steve Hoffman, Jul 22, 2013
    #43
  19. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    Fisher 800B again again.jpg
    My Fisher 800B had a system of AM/FM stereo as well as a multiplex unit, covering all bases.
     
    Steve Hoffman, Jul 22, 2013
    #44
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  20. MLutthans

    MLutthans That's my spaghetti, Chewbacca! Staff

    Location:
    Marysville, WA, Salina, KS, Los Angeles, CA
    "When was the first...." is often hard to pinpoint. For instance:

    •As somebody pointed out earlier (THANK YOU -- I have tried to beat this into people for years on this forum) the first stereo release by what I would call a "real" label is that Cook-format, dual groove LP from 1952 on Atlantic. There were many other releases in this format, but all were released by Cook as a sort of "boutique" item on his own label. This is the first and only one to be released by a "real "label, and it was an utter failure commercially, and a total one-off. It is available on CD, Collectables #COL-CD-6816. That was at least two years before RCA began releasing 2-track tapes, and six years before the stereo LP landed.

    •Movies were always way, way ahead of record labels when it came to stereo. Fantasia was recorded in the early 1940s and eventually saw stereo release on Disneyland Records, which is a "real" label. This is Cinerama was recorded on 7-track 35mm magnetic film tape starting in, I think, 1949, released to theatres in 1952. (7-track hi-fi recording and public-exhibition playback in 1952!) "Oklahoma" was recorded on 6-track mag starting in 1954, and saw stereo release on Capitol in, I think, 1958, although Capitol had virtually nothing to do with that recording, per se -- they were just a conduit for commercial release.

    •Bert Whyte piggy-backed on a Mercury Living Presence session on December 6, 1952 in Chicago. His friend C. Robert Fine was recording the session in mono for release on Mercury, and Bert recorded the session on a two-track recorder, strictly to experiment. That tape was transferred and released digitally a few years ago.

    •The first "proper" Mercury Living Presence recording in stereo was in Detroit in 1955, IIRC.

    •RCA's first attempt at stereo was on, as I recall, Munch and Stokowski sessions in late 1953. I'm sure somebody can chime in with actual dates on those. RCA's first "Stereo-Orthophonic" tapes came out in, I think, 1955.

    •Capitol's first attempts at stereo were, IIRC, in February 1956 at Goldwyn, John Palladino mixing a Stan Kenton session. This was released on stereo reel in 1957.

    •Capitol's NYC studios were still tracking some sessions in mono only as late as March of 1959!!! (Rudolf Firkusny solo-piano Brahms recordings.)

    Gotta run out the door for my wife's birthday bash. More later.....

    Matt
     
    MLutthans, Jul 22, 2013
    #45
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  21. MLutthans

    MLutthans That's my spaghetti, Chewbacca! Staff

    Location:
    Marysville, WA, Salina, KS, Los Angeles, CA
    Not sure if these were "the first" for these companies, but they were at least "the first" at Kingsway Hall for EMI and Decca:

     
    MLutthans, Jul 22, 2013
    #46
  22. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Location:
    Los Angeles
    I would have told those wacky Brits to push the mics closer.
     
    Steve Hoffman, Jul 22, 2013
    #47
  23. yasujiro

    yasujiro Senior Member

    Location:
    tokyo

    The Kubelik tape is included in this CD.
     
    yasujiro, Jul 22, 2013
    #48
  24. yasujiro

    yasujiro Senior Member

    Location:
    tokyo
    IIRC Decca made their first stereo session in Geneva in March 1954.
     
    yasujiro, Jul 22, 2013
    #49
  25. MLutthans

    MLutthans That's my spaghetti, Chewbacca! Staff

    Location:
    Marysville, WA, Salina, KS, Los Angeles, CA
    MLutthans, Jul 22, 2013
    #50
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