[Table of Contents]


[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: [ARSCLIST] Bix Beiderbecke "reissue" 78's



Thanks Dick. I would guess these Bix sets are dubs. Granted, we have 20 years' march of technology progress at play here, but there is no comparison, sound-wise, to the restorations on the Mosaic set of Bix, Tram and Big Tea. Listmember Doug Pomeroy made some or all of those disk-to-digital transfers. The sound quality is so supreior, much more life-like, on the Mosaic set, that I'd say all these 78's are good for is Victrola fodder -- something to play on the old Victrola to show "them yung-uns" how their great-grandparents listened to music.

-- Tom Fine

PS -- what's the best restoration out there these days for the Bix Gennett horn-recorded sides?

PPS -- speaking of horns, is there modern DAW software that does what Soundstream did with the Caruso recordings, attempts to mitigate the effects of a horn-recording system?

PPPS -- I just recently read an article about the latest digital-re-creation of a famous piano record, the new Art Tatum at the Shrine album. Apparently, the group that came up with that software is now adapting it for other instruments and thing they are a handful of years away from being able re-create the human voice! I have not heard the Tatum album or the early Glenn Gould album, but they have both gotten generally good reviews. The thrust of this article was, there may soon come a time when many different old low-fidelity recordings can be re-created in a near facsimile of the original playing in a modern high-fidelity setting. I remain skeptical but I will also say that people who know piano very well have said and written very good things about the Gould and Tatum albums, so this group seems to have nailed how to channel the ghost of a long-gone piano performance. It's interesting to think about the implications for archives if this technology becomes common and low-cost. There may be times where careful restoration and storage is far more expensive than digital re-creation of the material from a worn-out source.


----- Original Message ----- From: "Dick Spottswood" <dick@xxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 8:08 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Bix Beiderbecke "reissue" 78's



Most Columbia pre-WW2 jazz reissues derive from original metal parts, and
post-war pressings are always dubs. I suspect that the post-war popularity
of record changers prompted new pressings with lead-in and "improved "
lead-out grooves that activated changer mechanisms more aggressively.
Sometimes you can spot altered lead -out grooves on pressings from
original metals.  The 1937 Bessie Smith memorial album and four 1933
Goodman titles reissued on the special BENNY GOODMAN label (3167-D,
3168-D) were all dubbed.  They also marked the end of Columbia's 1-D
series, created in 1923.

Victor reissued a lot of 1920s jazz on Bluebird from the mid-30s onward,
from both original and dubbed metals.  Album reissue setsof JR Morton,
McKinney's Cotton Pickers etc. appeared in both Canada and the US.
Canadian sets use original parts;  US equivalents are dubbed.

Victor kept most of its Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers titles available
in the Bluebird and Montgomery Ward catalogs through the 1930s,  The first
Bluebird B-5000 series reissues were dubbed, just about everything else
used original parts.

Dick





Steven Smolian <smolians@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent by: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx>
09/10/2008 05:42 AM
Please respond to
Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx>


To ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx cc

Subject
Re: [ARSCLIST] Bix Beiderbecke "reissue" 78's






Jeff Wheeler has a book in progress on this isssue-er-reissue situation.


Steve Smolian


----- Original Message ----- From: "David Lennick" <dlennick@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Wednesday, September 10, 2008 12:16 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Bix Beiderbecke "reissue" 78's



Biltmore, not Biltmor..Biltmor was a Canadian label around 1950. Funny
about dropping the final E on common names..there was a label up here
called Yorkshir as well. We drop Es and add Us.

Biltmore, Temple, Sentry (and a few others) all put out dubs of rare
jazz
78s. Some of them weren't too atrocious. Some were..but how else were
you
going to say you owned a copy of Zulu's Ball?

dl

David Lennick wrote:
Sweet Sue was a dub, and there are two versions..the complete original
(4:25 or so) and one with the "florid introduction" removed. We had the

set with the complete version but the liner notes were unchanged, so
for
years I wondered how much longer the original could have been! I didn't

find the shorter version till just a few years ago.

And the second album is definitely all dubs, but all the Columbia
reissue
albums were dubs by this time, like Crosby Classics Volume II. In fact
Columbia was dubbing older European classical masters as well c. 1950.

Did Boris Rose have anything to do with Biltmor? I've seen some
lacquers
where the labels were the blank sides of old Biltmor labels.

dl

David Weiner wrote:
Some of the Columbia reissues - especially the first album, are
mostly
master pressings. I think the later album is all dubs.

The Biltmores are definitely all bootleg dubs.

Dave W.
----------------------

Hi All:

I am interested in details about two Bix Beiderbecke reissue 78's.

First of all, the albums put out by Columbia in the late 40's,
reissues
of
Okeh records -- were those made from old metal parts or are they dubs
of
old records?

Second, what's the story on the 78's put out on the Biltmore label?
These
seem to be either licensed reissues or bootlegs of old Gennett and
Victor records, of the Wolverines
and the Whiteman band.

Thanks in advance for any answers!

-- Tom Fine








[Subject index] [Index for current month] [Table of Contents]