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Re: [ARSCLIST] 1/4" audio tape digitizing



I've done many different tapes and disks from my collection and the family archives over the past 4 years or so. I've been careful to try and do a nice job from the get-go so none of the early attempts are having to get redone, although some of them will get a 96/24 treatment somewhere down the line.

None of it is fast or can be done lightly. It's not worth getting into unless you can put forth the effort to get good quality. That means washing disks, having good tape repro gear so tapes play as well as they can and having a good-sounding A-D chain. I don't advocate throwing money at the problem, just get a system that does the job for you. I do not advocate things like much-faster-than-real-time transfers just because "it didn't sound that great to begin with."

Basically, just come up with a decent transfer chain and dive in. The stuff's not getting younger, nor are we.

PS -- if you find any of that "World Ear Project" stuff, I'd love to hear it. What a great idea.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- From: "Russ Hamm" <rhamm@xxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, February 14, 2006 11:25 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] 1/4" audio tape digitizing



Lou, et al -


There has got to be tons of material like this. I know of a few lodes of
taped material here in San Diego of varying significance. I recall living
in the S.F. Bay Area in the '60s when KPFA and also the UC radio station
participated in something called the National Tape Network (NTN). There was
at that time something called "The World Ear Project" where people sent in
their own tapes of everything - mostly ambient sounds from various
locations. I submitted quite a few tapes myself, and I know a friend of
mine sent tapes recorded on the streets during the student protests in
1964. I'm trying to work out an approach for my own small collection of
tapes and those of some friends. It is overwhelming - triage to prioritize
what gets dealt with, trying to budget time and cash resources, working out
storage, and for anything of significance - how to approach providing some
kind of access.

Russ

<Lou Judson wrote:>
This IS a dilemma for some of us. I have a huge garagefull of tapes of nearly every live music mix I ever did, back to 1970. The only one that is getting transferred so far are the Van Morrison shows which a fan is paying me to transfer. Who wants to hear tthe Bitov Bulgarian Ensemble playing live on KPFA? Nobody will even buy the tape to re-use any mmore, as it is alll 3M 176.... Our society is woefully poor about recycling this kind of petroleum and other materials..... too bad for the future generaations!

<L>

Lou Judson . Intuitive Audio
415-883-2689

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Russ Hamm
Ed Tech Specialist
National School District (http://nsd.us)
San Diego County, California
tel. (619) 336-7752
FAX (619) 336-7551



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