Gramophone Records

[oggbashan]

I have a collection of 78 rpm shellac gramophone records. Some are from the 1940s, 50s and 60s but I consider the gems of my collection are those recorded before the First World War. Some are very heavy and single-sided.

I play them infrequently but I enjoy them. Many of the recordings are available on CD but they don't sound the same.

It still seems amazing that I can hear an opera singer performing in 1903 exactly as his or her fans heard the performance in their homes. What items of today's technology will still work efficiently in 100 years' time?

In the later records I have Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Paul Robeson, Nat King Cole, Glenn Miller and many others. Some are well known recordings, some are rare, but all of them sound more immediate on 78rpm than as CDs.

Is it my hearing? Or just nostalgia?

Og

 

[rgraham666]

Nope. As I understand it, digital washes out the sound.

Which to me, makes sense. All digital is a lot of zeroes and ones. So at best it's an image of the sound, not the sound itself.

Analog, like gramophones, catches all the little nuances that the ear and brain then pick up.

Or so I believe.

 

[Emperor_Nero]

I think it's a bit of both.
As Rob already stated, digital gives up some of the nuances as all you have are 0s and 1s to create the sound. It's like painting the Mona Lisa using just two colors ... you could probably blend and blend and do something that looks pretty close, but it won't be the same.
I think nostalga adds another layer though. The first time you heard this music, you heard it with all the background noise inherent to an analog recording (all that static hissing and an occational pop and crack). It's those sounds that take your mind back to that first time, when you first fell in love with the music.
My collection doesn't go quite that far back, but I have several singles and albums from the 50s and early 60s that I feel the same way about. I can listen to Chuck Berry, the Beatles and the Beach Boys on CD, but they never sound so good as when I break out those old 45s and 33 1/3 albums.

 

[Liar]

In the later records I have Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Paul Robeson, Nat King Cole, Glenn Miller and many others. Some are well known recordings, some are rare, but all of them sound more immediate on 78rpm than as CDs.

Is it my hearing? Or just nostalgia?

Different technology, different sound dymanics (better in some way, worse in other ways) different carriers... Different amplifying and speaker system perhaps? It's bound to have different characteristic.

Better or worse? It depends on what you're after. Digital media have a more even and accurate distribution of volume, whereas grammophone tracks produce higher contrasts. More mid-range sounds get over-amplified or supressed. Now, this doesn't mean that a "clean" reproduction is the best, I mean, we all mix with the equalizer buttons to beef up the low and high frequencies to the way we like it, right? The same can be a good idea for volume levels, but not many stereo systems can do that.

 

[Jenny_Jackson]

I think a little of both, Og, me friend. The technology of today is way too good. The old records still have a place. I have all me ma's 78's from the 40's and 50's. They are prescious both for the joy of hearing those artists long dead and the memories attached to the records themselves.

 

[jomar]

Ogg, If you want to listen to the music from the records but don't want to put wear and tear on the vinyl, they make turntables that record the music directly to mp3 files (or whatever) using a usb connection. There may be a gramophone equivalent. This method may better preserve the warmth of the recordings. Bound to be some forum discussions on the subject somewhere.

 

[cheerful_deviant]

I find it doubtful that any of today's recording technologies will hold up nearly was well over the years as older methods.

When CDs first came out everyone thought that they were the perfect recording method and would last forever. Now after 20 years or so it turns out that many of the first CDs are not readable anymore. The thin aluminum sandwich that the actual zeros and ones are burned into degrades and corrodes over time due to tiny scratches not in the face of the CD where everyone worries about them, but on the lable side which covers the actual data plate.

Digital technology is all well and good but the other problem is that the technology changes so fast. I have hundreds of old sound clips on my old (very old) Mac but can't play them on anything anymore because there are no longer any drivers available for current operating systems.

So if you want to keep all your data for 100 years, better keep a prestine machine to read it on and hope that it doesn't crap out on you. Or hope that the format you saved it is doesn't fall out of favor.

 

[oggbashan]

Playing 78s

Thanks for the replies.

I have an unusual way of preparing my shellac gramophone records for playing - tips given to me by a man who used to service wind-up gramophones.

I brush the record around the grooves with a new one inch paint brush. On the turntable I have a rubber mat. Immediately before playing, I hold the record under running cold water, shake off the surplus, and then play on a 1970s deck with scratch filters etc. The piant brush removes any dust. The film of water dampens out any scratches. That way I get the best reproduction from a worn disc.

Do NOT try this with vinyl, and some late 78s were made in vinyl.

Og

 

[maggot420]

The music you hear on CD's is compressed. The highest and lowest frequencies are filtered out because they take up more space and with digital technology, memory is at a premium. It was thought that because the human ear can't detect those frequencies anyway, it wouldn't matter that they aren't there but the purists claim that even though you can't technically hear those frequncies, it still makes a difference when they are absent.
So in actuality, the music recorded on vinyl and shellac and even wax is more dynamic than what you hear on a cd. The music might not be as clean as digital, but analog has always been warmer.

 

[Weird Harold]

It was thought that because the human ear can't detect those frequencies anyway, it wouldn't matter that they aren't there but the purists claim that even though you can't technically hear those frequncies, it still makes a difference when they are absent.

The purists are correct that ultra-sonic and subsonic frequencies do interact with audible frequencies and make a difference.

They are however wrong about those frequencies being present in the playback of vinyl/shellac records -- especially old records like Oggs.

I wasn't until the development of hi-fidelity audio tape recording that the very high and very low frequencies could be reliably recorded and reproduced -- by eliminating the inertia of a physical needle following a physical groove.

Digital recording and playback may not be perfect but it does provide consistent recreations without the inherent "noise" of any other recording media.

 

[Liar]

The purists are correct that ultra-sonic and subsonic frequencies do interact with audible frequencies and make a difference.

Which is why the real audio geeks go with SACD or DVD-Audio instead of regular CDs.

Personally, I hear no diffenrence, not even on the $100k hifi sets that supposedly can handle it. And anyway, the music don't get any more groove however fancy the equipment.

 

[Weird Harold]

Personally, I hear no difference, not even on the $100k hifi sets that supposedly can handle it. And anyway, the music don't get any more groove however fancy the equipment.

99% of human beings, even the hardcore audio purists, can't hear the difference between the harmonics of a live performance and a moderately high-quality recording played-back on a top-of-the-line system.

Most people however can feel the difference between being present at a live performance and "experiencing" a recording.

Audiophiles have been searching for a recording/playback system that can duplicate the feel of a live performance since the printing press permitted mass distribution of sheet music.

 

[oggbashan]

...They are however wrong about those frequencies being present in the playback of vinyl/shellac records -- especially old records like Oggs...

When you see pictures and movies of how the old acoustic 78s were recorded, with the persons in a duet alternately shouting down a large megaphone, it is a wonder that they sound as good as they do.

Solo voice and solo piano sound best in the early recordings. The sounds of an orchestra or ensemble are often muddy and unclear.

Og

 

[Liar]

99% of human beings, even the hardcore audio purists, can't hear the difference between the harmonics of a live performance and a moderately high-quality recording played-back on a top-of-the-line system.

No, but many would like to think they can hear it. That's why there's a market for gold lined signal cables for $100/foot.

I record, mix, and publish music with equipment that would make self proclaimed audiophiles scoff. And they still claim it sounds "the way it should" when played on their high-end systems, even though the quality bottleneck is out of their hands.

 

[drksideofthemoon]

A lot of the old 78's were recorded direct to master. There was little to no mixing. I think a big board in those days had at most, 4 to 8 inputs. The band would strike up, and the recording would start. There were no overdubs, harmonizers, compressors, digital delay lines...

 

[oggbashan]

A lot of the old 78's were recorded direct to master. There was little to no mixing. I think a big board in those days had at most, 4 to 8 inputs. The band would strike up, and the recording would start. There were no overdubs, harmonizers, compressors, digital delay lines...

My pre-First World War 78s are acoustic - recorded mechanically to wax. Any error by the musicians and the whole 4 minutes had to be recorded again.

Og

 

[drksideofthemoon]

My pre-First World War 78s are acoustic - recorded mechanically to wax. Any error by the musicians and the whole 4 minutes had to be recorded again.

Og

Do you have any Edison cylinders? And any idea when they changed from the cylinders to the flat platter?

 

[oggbashan]

Do you have any Edison cylinders? And any idea when they changed from the cylinders to the flat platter?

No. Our local museum has some, and they sometimes turn up in our antique shops. One shop in Sandwich, Kent, sells cylinders and the players, as well as gramophones and 78s.

Cylinders were still being sold at the start of the First World War in 1914. The first flat gramophone records, produced in Germany, were sold in the UK in the 1890s.

As with the end of 78s and the start of LPs/33s, both technologies were on sale and overlapping. 78s were still issued in the UK in the mid 1960s.

Og