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Re: [ARSCLIST] commerical reels history (was Boston Pops question)
Tom Fine wrote:
Hi Jack:
Just to clarify the history here, when you say "2-track (non-stereo)"
do you mean half-track (2-sided mono) or do you mean one-direction
mono? And, if you mean one-direction mono, are you sure they are not
full-track? It should clarify this on the tape boxes, although the
nomenclature used early on varied between companies.
I have three Sonotape recordings on 7" reels which are from the
Westminster catalog. They are each labeled on the back of the box,
Recording: Half Track--(Upper)
Speed: 7 1/2 inches per second
Track 1: Forward
Track 2: Reverse
I forgot to mention one thing in my post before -- some of these old
tapes can be real gems and the best available source. Here's a
for-instance. Apparently, the master tapes for most or all of the
Everest Woody Herman albums are lost. The CD reissues are all
obviously (and poorly) made from LPs (clearly audible groove
distortion, sloppy and overbearing tick and pop removal, digital
artifacts galore from over-agressive noise-reduction). I was able to
borrow the quarter-track, not even the 2-track but the early
quarter-track duped reels and it was like night and day. Especially in
the case of the Woody Herman and Tito Puente session, the reels were
dynamic and rarely distorted while the CD reissue made from LPs was
awful. There was an earlier European or Asian CD of this same material
that sounds like it was made from a cleaner LP and is not aggressively
digi-tooled to where there are annoying artifacts but it's still not
as good as the reel. From what I've been able to gather, most of the
Everest pop and jazz master tapes are either lost or badly damaged, so
one hopes there are a few more of these quarter-track, or better
2-track, reels floating around. Especially in the case of the earlier
dupers (half-tracks, 2-tracks and very early quarter-tracks), the
quality is usually very good aside from hissy tape. By the early 60's,
duping speeds were faster and quality is not as good. By the time you
got to the release product being 3.75IPS and duping speeds were up to
16x, the quality was awful. Aside from saving tape, duping to 3.75IPS
allowed standard duping speeds in factories that by then were mainly
doing 8-tracks, although a place with a decent on-going quarter-track
business would have a separate duping line for that.
There are several good articles covering the evolution of tape duping
in the archives of the AES Journal. Anyone interested can search and
buy articles at the AES website. Ampex published articles about the
first 3200 system in the mid-50's, their higher-speed system for
multiple formats in teh early 60's and their solid-state bin-loop
system in the late 60's. I believe at least one of the makers of
cassette duping equipment published at least one article, too.
Tape duping must have been at least marginally profitable because
people stayed in it all through reels, 8-tracks and cassettes. There
was one brief moment, at the end of the LP era as CD's were just
catching on, maybe 2 years in the early 80's, when cassettes outsold
LPs. This was after the Walkman caught on big-time and before CD's
were mainstream (when players still cost a grand and didn't sound so
great). CD's then caught on and the cassette began submerging. I'm not
sure there are any large-scale cassette duping for commercial music
operations left. There are some operations taylored to smaller jobs
who will do, for instance, 100 copies of a set of medical conference
recordings or 1000 cassette box sets for Radio Spirits. I believe
cassette duping for music is still a viable business in Asia but I
might be wrong about that.
-- Tom Fine
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message ----- From: "Jack Palmer" <vdalhart@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, April 08, 2007 8:16 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] commerical reels history (was Boston Pops
question)
I checked about a hundred of my tapes and I am not sure any of the
2 track (non stereo) were from 1952. I have several 2 track
non-stereo tapes, 7 1/2 speed that were issued by Ampex for London.
No date on the box or tape reel, so I can't be certain of the date.
None of the early 2 tracks I bought were stereo though. I thought
the high-fidelity was great and worth the money. Thanks for making me
look. I found three Gilbert and Sullivan operettas on reels that I
didn't even remember owning. Jack
----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom Fine"
<tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, April 08, 2007 7:10 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] commerical reels history (was Boston Pops
question)
I'd be interested to know what's on them and who released them. I do
not believe you'll find that they are in fact 2T stereo. They are
likely half-track (2-sided) mono. If they are stereo, it would be
very interesting to know who put them out as in 1952 only a few
people were experimenting with 2-channel stereo recording of music.
No major labels yet, although I believe RCA started making 2T
masters in 1954 or even 1953 -- I think Zarathustra with Reiner was
the first 2T session.
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message ----- From: "Jack Palmer"
<vdalhart@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, April 08, 2007 12:29 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] commerical reels history (was Boston Pops
question)
I bought my first 2 track tapes for my reel recorder/player in
the Base Exchange in Sidi-Slimane, Morocco in 1952. I still have a
couple of them in fact. Jack
----- Original Message ----- From: "Tom Fine"
<tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, April 07, 2007 9:40 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] commerical reels history (was Boston Pops
question)
Ampex developed their own, was developed by Leon Wortman in NY and
detailed in a 1951 Radio & TV News article. Wortman's line made
full-track or half-track tapes. Commercial half-track tapes were
available as early as 1951 or 1952, but there was only a very
small consumer market for reel to reel machines at that point. >
Because this was a new format sold at a premium price, a lot of QC
attention was paid by the reputable companies in this era, so the
net quality is very high. Akin to what happened when stereo LPs
came along.
.