Re: [ARSCLIST] "Aircheck" history

[Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Many air-check transcriptions I have heard also sound vastly superior to commercial records of the 
time. However, as can be heard on some CD reissues, a lot better quality was captured in the studio 
than make it to noisy-surface 78's, which may be played to death by the time someone my age got 
their hands on it. Some CD's made from clean metal parts sound excellent.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "David Lennick" <dlennick@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, February 09, 2006 7:41 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] "Aircheck" history


> Rod Stephens wrote:
>
> > Hi Tom,
> >
> > Here's a little more info on "aircheck" from this web site:
> > http://www.oldradio.com/current/bc_1sts.htm
> >
> > > ... AIRCHECK
> > >
> > >     * According to some reports, the oldest existing aircheck dates to
> > >       the Armistice Day broadcast, November 10, 1923.
> > >     * Some WEAF broadcasts of the NY Philharmonic are said to predate
> > >       that slightly.
> > >
>
> Most of the NY Philharmonic aircheck discs I transferred were from December
> 1923 (3rd, 11th and 17th) and January and April 1924, but there was one disc of
> unknown provenance and an unidentified orchestra (not the Philharmonic,
> according to Steve Smolian) playing the Espana Rhapsody and dated July 7, 1923.
> These were recordings Western Electric was making in its experiments to develop
> electrical recording..some of them sound excellent, by the way, with more
> presence and more frequency range than the early commercial discs made by
> Victor and Columbia (which had to be "safe" so as not to blast or wear out on
> the players of the day).
>
> dl
>
> > Rod Stephens
> >
> > Tom Fine wrote:
> >
> > > What is the genesis of the term "aircheck" and how did it come to mean
> > > "off-air recording", or did it mean something different at another time?
> > >
> > > -- Tom Fine
> > >