SH Spotlight Distortion free trumpets in the 20s-40s. But BLUE NOTE? WHAT HAPPENED? RVG Evil Neumann mics?

You mean Criteria Recording Studios in Miami.

 

Yes, a product of Nippon Phonogram/Mercury (Mercury wound up with the Keynote masters in the early 1950's) some history for you.

 

An incredible song, covered by so many musicians, obviously this song has a lot of meaning for these musicians!

 

Have not heard enough of Pop's recordings, this one is really good, thanks!

 

+1

 

Hi Steve! I have a question about this. When I listen to Kevin Gray’s remasters of the Classic Vinyl Series and Tone Poets, I notice that this type of distortion you’re talking about is quite prevalent… often more so than some of the OG and early 70s pressings I have, and more than the CD versions a lot of the time too (but not always).

Is this because that’s truly what the master tapes sound like? I’ve wondered if it was because Kevin just masters “hot”, or if there’s more to it, that we’re actually hearing a truer representation of the recording and the OGs are the heavily edited versions?

Thank you so much!

 

The horns on Chicago Live At Carnegie Hall are small, buzzy, and distorted - not a great combination

 

Late to this thread. But experiencing a couple of issues with BN and Prestige re-issue recordings from the 50's.

The trumpets are a bit edgy but these don't seem to bother me other than the occasional edge that is annoying.

What I'm struggling with is the rhythmic tapping of cymbals or high-hat cymbal on certain recordings. There seems to be a lot of spit / sibilance that comes and goes through various tracks. Very annoying

In some cases the rhythmic tapping of a closed high hat cymbal come across less like a cymbal and more like a cheap tambourine or maraca sound and it worse on my more resolving cartridges. I can put on a lower resolution cartridge and the annoyance goes away, but so does the rest of the excitement of the music.

Just curious if this is a similar consequence of those 50's recordings?

As you say, there doesn't seem to be this problem on RVG recordings from the 60's

 

No. Not that I can recall. I have a fair number of Columbia Jazz from the late 50's (Miles Davis, Duke Ellington) and they don't seem to have this problem (on either vintage or reissue).

50's Capitol and Decca had other problems with clarity/ presence, but never the same type of cymbal distortion. The Decca albums that I've had in the past may not have been RIAA equalization which may have mad them sound thin. I didn't have enough of them to buy a pre-amp with the different eq curves.

The distortion is only on the cymbals. The rest of the instruments piano, bass, trumpets along side the cymbals are prefectly clear. If the cartridge was mis-tracking, would the other instruments get messed up ?

 

LOL. My 50's Blue Note records are like my Ortofon 2M Black. Both are a love / hate items.

 

But my Masterpieces by Ellington from 1951 sounds amazing!