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I
DON'T know quite
how to begin this month's column. Regular readers will
recall that in the past two issues I have been promising
some sensational news concerning three-channel stereophonic
sound. This "scoop" was promised for this, the September
issue. Fortunately, the news will be presented this month,
but unfortunately it will be nowhere near as detailed a
report as I had hoped to bring to you. As I have said in
previous issues . . . writing a column two months in advance
has its drawbacks and in this case there was many a slip
'twixt the cup and the lip. Don't get me wrong! This will
still be one of the most sensational, provocative and
industry-shaking announcements in the brief, but
spectacular, history of high fidelity! However, I know that
if I were not bound by certain restrictions, this report
would have had twice the impact. Perhaps, remembering the
obstacles and frustrations I encountered during the
labor-pains and birth of binaural and two channel stereo, I
have tried to go too far too fast, in an effort to
circumvent these difficulties. I guess I'm just a hot-headed
Irishman, boiling with enthusiasm for hi-fi in general and
stereophonic sound in particular, with a burning desire to
help bring this fabulous sound to fruition and make stereo
available to everyone! Well, restrictions notwithstanding .
. . what I've got is great and a big step forward, so here
goes . . .!
You will recall I reported on the 3-channel Ampex
demonstration with the San Francisco Symphony, and then got
up on my soapbox and blithely asked why not 3-channel sound
for the home? I acknowledged the multitude of difficulties
such an undertaking would entail, daydreamed a little . . .
and then got down to the brass tacks of what would be
necessary to bring 3-channel stereo to commercial reality.
In summation it was concluded that even if there were large
numbers of people who could afford the great expense of
existing 3-channel tape machines, or even if a relatively
inexpensive 3-channel tape playback machine became
available, they would all be quite useless without a source
of recorded 3-channel stereophonic tapes. Yessir, we were
right back at the old bug-a-boo . . . without a continuous
source of good recorded tapes the stereo balloon would never
get off the ground. I use the words "continuous" and "good"
advisedly . . . drawing on the experience with binaural and
two channel stereo, where a good many enthusiasts of the
early days rushed out to buy the necessary equipment to play
stereo and then were subjected to the frustration of having
only the most sporadic trickle of tapes released, and even
these were generally of very indifferent quality. Some of
the most inane, rankly "gimmick" type repertoire was thrust
upon these poor souls with the excuse that it was "stereo"
which made everything "all right"! I must insist that this
is a ridiculous attitude.
Generally, if a person thinks highly enough of his hi-fi to
indulge himself in stereo equipment, he is usually a few
cuts above the average in musical discrimination and stereo
or not . . . he wants either good classical or good jazz
material . . . sensibly chosen repertoire, performed
reasonably well by professional executants of known
reputation, and it goes without saying, the highest degree
of technical excellence in the tape he buys. Happily, the
days of the "gimmick" releases is about over with 2-channel
stereo since the advent of the stereo tapes by RCA Victor
and other forward looking companies. I think a lot of people
have learned a lesson and the buyer of 3-channel stereo will
be a more cautious fellow than his 2-channel predecessor,
and the same can be said of the recording companies who, as
you shall see, will offer tapes of genuine musical substance
with the added plus of 3-channel stereo, rather than issue
tapes where the stereo "effect" is the thing and the music
merely subsidiary.
So, realizing the problem confronting three channel stereo
for the home was largely a question of recorded tape
availability, I decided (without much hope of success I
admit) to sniff around the recording companies and ferret
out as much information as I could on the possibilities of
their producing 3-channel stereophonic tapes. Being a
reviewer one naturally gets to know a lot of people in the
recording industry, so at least I had the advantage that I
wasn't approaching this thing "cold turkey"! My first
inquiries were treated about as I expected.... Boy, you
should have seen the raised eyebrows! I guess most of them
figured I had flipped my lid, and I could see the prevailing
attitude was that I was strictly for the birds! Not that I
blame them very much. While most outfits have been recording
2-channel stereo for some time, few had released any as yet
and here I was madly yakking about 3 channels! I must admit
things were more than a bit discouraging and I was about to
concede that 3-channel stereo was still quite a few years
away, when I got the first faint flickering of hope! One of
the big record clubs had been recording 3-channel stereo for
some time . . . but
not for the purposes of issuing the results in the form of
recorded tapes! They were
using a technique which was fairly common with 2-channel
machines in making monaural tape masters for subsequent disc
transfer . . . that of post-mixing. In other words after the
actual recording session, the engineers would play back the
3-channel tape and then, mixing whatever percentage of each
channel they wanted, they obtained the desired monaural
signal which was recorded on a standard monaural tape
machine. It is not my purpose here to debate the pros and
cons of this technique, but one fact is of course quite
obvious . . . here is a source of 3-channel stereo tape,
since there is no law that says one has to post-mix and use
the 3-channel master for no other purpose!
While this certainly was encouraging, it didn't help too
much as I drew a blank as far as being able to determine if
the release of any 3-channel material was ever contemplated.
I would have pursued the matter further (even though my
contacts with the clubs are second and third person since I
do not review their products), when I got a phone call that
changed everything. "Would you care to hear some white
labels (test pressings) of some new material tonight?"
inquired the feminine voice with the soft Texas drawl....
Would I! This is tantamount to offering a man dying of
thirst a bucket of ice cold spring water! Naturally, I like
to avail myself of every opportunity to observe and hear the
work of the professional recordist in his native habitat.
The caller was the very charming and talented administrative
director of Mercury Records, Miss Wilma Cozart. I was to
meet her and Mr. Bob Fine, chief engineer of Mercury in
Studio C in the 5th Avenue, New York headquarters of Mercury
Records.
That night, I had no sooner stepped through the thick
soundproof door of the studio and was shaking hands all
around when my eyes riveted themselves on the familiar sight
of an Ampex 300 tape console with the most unfamiliar
addition of oversize tape guides, tape gate, and capstan and
capstan roller designed to accommodate the half-inch tape
that was threaded through the machine. A wild thought ran
through my head and I looked at my hosts who by now were
both wearing big grins. "Could this be a 3-channel stereo
setup?", I inquired rather warily of Mr. Fine. Both he and
Miss Cozart laughed and said that knowing of my interest in
stereophonic sound they had rigged up a demonstration that I
might find entertaining. By Gadfrey if that wasn't the
understatement of the century! Studio C is a room about 35
ft. wide by roughly 60 feet deep and with a nice 20 foot
ceiling. Near the entrance is the glass enclosed control
booth and at the far end a big curved projection screen that
receives its images from the projection booth high in the
back end of the room. Behind the screen are three monster
Jim Lansing theater speaker systems, driven by three 60 watt
McIntosh amplifiers! This studio is ordinarily used to score
movie films for various types of multi-channel sound,
including Mr. Fine's own "Perspecta" sound process. Being
obviously all set up and prepared for me, Mr. Fine punched
the start button on the Ampex and the big reel of half-inch
tape began to feed through the tape gate. In a few seconds a
slight increase in tape noise over the normal background
told me we had reached the "live" portion of the tape and an
instant later my astonished ears heard the purest, cleanest,
most fabulous sound I have ever encountered as the speakers
gave forth with the striking opening bars of "Tabuh
Tabuhan," an exotic work by Colin McPhee . . . a new Mercury
release featuring the Rochester Symphony Orchestra conducted
by Howard Hanson.
The disc is reviewed later in these pages and it is an
outstanding recording in every respect . . . but good as it
is, it was pallid in comparison to the incredible realism of
the 3-channel stereo. I am sincere when I say I was
literally stunned with what I was hearing. It was hard to
believe the Rochester Symphony Orchestra wasn't there before
me on the stage. No, that isn't quite correct really,
because in many ways this was far better than the real
thing! I mean it . . . it would be a rare seat in a rarer
concert hall where all that I heard on this stereo tape
could be heard equally as well. The most startling aspect,
of course, was the infinitely greater sharpness and
delineation of the inner orchestral details. This was quite
unbelievable and I heard things on the tape that were but
tenuous hints on the discs. String tone? You've never heard
anything like this! Even in the highest registers of the
first violins there was no screech, no eardrum piercing
edginess, rather there was a smoothness only previously
encountered in the confines of the concert hall. The
richness of the second strings, the mellow throb of the
cell), the dark sonority of the contrabass), all were
vibrantly alive with realism. The contrabassi were
especially spectacular. Ordinarily even on good records and
through good hi-fi equipment, the bass viols have a sort of
"voom-voom" sound . . . low enough in frequency to be sure,
but without much character. Here on the 3-channel stereo,
you can begin to appreciate the throbbing power they
generate, and you can perceive the individual tones and
timbres of each string, you can feel the deep resonance,
hear the higher harmonics, detect subtleties and nuances of
bowing and fingering impossible to hear on a disc.
With 3-channel stereo, brass sonorities are breathtaking.
Trumpets have a clean brightness equaled only by the real
thing. And with this brightness there is a roundness and
fullness of tone, a sense of swelling power not found on
discs or on regular tape either. In staccato and other rapid
passages, there is no blurring or fuzziness whatever . . .
all is sharp and incisive. Trombones have their
characteristic blare, but again with a rounder, fuller tone,
and when they are guttural and growl "way down in the low
frequencies," you can still perceive the timbre of the
instrument . . . it isn't lost in muddy distortion as on so
many discs. The woodwinds are quite extraordinary. The
stereo probes extremes of the various instruments in a
fashion almost totally alien to discs and monaural tapes.
The characteristic breathiness of the flute and piccolo is
almost palpable in its liveness and realism. Vibrato is
noted to a much greater extent than on the other media. The
clarinet, bassoon, oboe, English horn, are heard with
exceptional purity of tone.
Returning for a moment to the brass, that most difficult of
instruments to record&emdash;the French horn is heard on
stereo as a very clean, full-bodied and richly resonant
sound. Its heroic sound, embellished by the spaciousness of
stereo is a thing of unearthly beauty. Percussion on
3-channel stereo is best described as awesome. On bass drum
not just the whump and the thud is heard, but the tone as
well. More than this, you can feel the tremendous power as
the sound envelope hits you. Tympani are super clean, crisp,
and precise, and you can feel the tautness of the stretched
drumskin. It is also a great deal easier to discern whether
the tympanist is using hard or soft mallets or bare sticks.
Snares, whether gut or wire, are easily distinguished,
cymbals, gongs, bells, triangles, xylophones . . . the whole
percussion battery can be heard with a cleanness and
articulation not possible in anything but 3-channel
stereo.
The directionality of the 3-channel stuff I heard was
fantastic and actually I was surprised at the degree of
superiority over two channel stereo. With tri-stereo, it was
not necessary to stay in a more or less circumscribed spot,
to obtain the maximum directional effect. Positioning
oneself right or left of the center line naturally threw
into focus the instruments which prevail on one or the other
side of the orchestra, yet there was little difficulty in
perceiving the interplay between the various choirs. Best of
all . . . the "hole"
(in the middle --ed.)
which is more or less apparent
in many bi-stereo tapes, was no longer evident. In fact this
elimination of the center "hole" with the third or middle
speaker seems to have much more significance than I would
have believed. With the three channels no matter where you
stand or how uneducated your ear, it is completely and
instantly obvious that you are listening to stereophonic
sound. Probably the most important aspect of the third
channel, however, is not the increased "right-to-left"
directionality that it affords, but that it adds the new
dimensions of "front-to-back." This is truly the crux of the
case for 3-channel stereo . . . the attainment of depth for
a true three dimensional sound. The third channel is
cumulative in its effects, and the totality adds up to the
fact that when it is combined with two other channels, it is
markedly superior to the two channels alone. The addition of
the depth makes the illusion of presence complete and unless
you hear tri-stereo, you won't believe the fantastic
difference that third channel makes in terms of musical
realism.
"Tabuh-Tabuhan" came to its triumphant conclusion and I was
sitting with mouth agape when I suddenly woke up and started
firing questions. IS there any more . . . Is this just
experimental . . . etc., etc., ad infinitum! Well good
people, here
is the thing that is going to stagger
you! Mercury has been
recording 3-channel stereo since the beginning of the year
and already has built up an impressive backlog! This is a
continuing program and everything Mercury now records for
disc is also recorded in tri-stereo! WHY is Mercury doing
this? They are recording 3-channel stereo
with the
intent and purpose of releasing recorded tapes for public
consumption! No, I'm not
kidding you . . . it's a fact ! ! !
What repertoire is now available you ask? Sad to relate my
friends but, at the moment, nothing is available. Oh yes,
like I said, they have tapes all right . . . that same
evening I was treated to parts of many works. Dorati and the
Minneapolis doing the Brahms "Third," reviewed in these
pages last month, the same conductor and orchestra doing
Tchaikovsky's "Cappricio Italien" which I reviewed two
months ago, Paul Paray and the Detroit Orchestra doing
Debussy's "Iberia," the same conductor and orchestra in new
items like Chausson's "Symphony in B Flat," and some
Wagnerian works, Dorati again with Richard Strauss' "Till
Eulenspiegel" and there are many others. As you can see, I
was literally drowned in gorgeous tristereo and I can tell
you that this was the hi-fi experience of a lifetime. It was
simply an overwhelming thing and I hope that before too long
others will be able to experience the same thrills. I said
nothing was available at the moment and here are the whys
and wherefores. Remember, I told you this material was all
on special half-inch tape instead of the standard
quarter-inch. Reason for this, of course, is that the wider
tape and the extra width of the gap in the three special
heads will afford a better signal-to-noise ratio which is
important if quiet tape dubs are to result. So that's the
first reason . . . non-standard tape width. I suppose that
if some millionaire were to indulge himself with a
tri-stereo Ampex 300 modified for half-inch he might be able
to get a stereo tape dub from Mercury.
Quite obviously, if Mercury is to release this 3-channel
stereo, the economics of the matter dictate that 3-channel
quarter-inch
tape will be the medium. Now here is the rub . . . the
number of 3-channel quarter-inch Ampex units that have been
produced is quite minute. To my knowledge there is but one
unit on the whole East Coast! Again it is obvious that
although Mercury could dub its half-inch stuff down to
one-quarter, this machine-to-machine at regular tape speed
hardly constitutes a method of quantity production. So the
problem is really one of duplication.
I have been given to understand that Mercury is trying to
work out a feasible method of quantity production and if
they are successful, they hope to be able to release some
tri-stereo this fall or winter. I might add here, that like
any new development, initial costs will probably be fairly
high although every effort will be made to keep the tapes as
reasonable as possible.
By now the thought has probably occurred to you that even if
the Mercury tapes were ten cents each and plentiful as
potatoes, they wouldn't be much use to you without a tape
playback machine which could handle 3-channel stereo. And so
we have come full circle and we are back at the other end of
the problem. I think everyone will agree that the prime
problem with 3-channel stereo is tape availability. Now that
we know at least one company is doing something about it, it
is safe to assume that other companies will soon follow
suit. So having gotten a good start on the tape problem,
there is now the question of the tape playback and who makes
it and for how much? I wish I could give you more
information about this. . . for the affluent there is of
course, Ampex. For "Joe Doakes, music lover," I cannot give
much encouragement beyond this . . . one company, well known
for its inexpensive "component-type" tape machines has gone
so far as to build prototype 3-channel, 1/4th-inch heads. If
successful, and there is every reason to believe they will
be, these heads would be available with their regular
production tape mechanisms and as a replacement or addition
to heads in existing units. What will these units cost? I
have no way of knowing but the fantastic figure of "under
$200" has been bandied about and if this were to be true, it
means that with three of the most modest amplifiers and
three small but reasonable quality speakers a 3-channel
stereo system could be had for about 400 to 500 dollars.
This still isn't chicken feed I'll admit, but I will
guarantee to you that it will sound better from a musical
standpoint than the most expensive and elaborate
single-channel system. So there you have it friends.
We are on the threshold of fabulous 3-channel stereosound,
years earlier than we had any right to expect. That there
are still problems to be solved with both tapes and machines
is evident, but at least a start has been made and if the
hi-fi public will get behind the idea and show the various
manufacturers that they are really interested . . . you'll
see the problems cleaned up in short order. I will watch the
progress on this matter and try to keep you well
informed.
As you can see, this important report was quite lengthy, but
I certainly think it was worthwhile. In consequence of its
length, we won't have much space for reviews so I'll make up
for it next month with literally no introductory yak and as
many reviews as we can squeeze in the column.
Equipment used this month. Components Corp. turntable;
New Weathers viscous damped arm, cartridge, and oscillator;
Marantz audio consolette; 2-60 watt Mclntosh amplifiers;
Jensen "Imperial" speaker; Electro-Voice "Georgian" speaker;
and Ampex tape equipment.
MOZART
CONCERTO # 13 FOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA
CONCERTO # 20 FOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA
Julius Katchen, pianist with New Symphony Orchestra of
London conducted by Peter Mang. London LL1357. RIAA curve.
Price $3.98.
Another London contribution to this Mozart year, this
recording is especially welcome for the fine version of the
"13th Concerto " which is not heard very often. Katchen is
in fine form here with vigorous and well paced readings. His
phrasing and dynamic shading seem much improved over some of
his recent work. His tone is quite big, but fortunately he
avoids excesses like percussive harshness. His reading of
the "13th Concerto" certainly is the best that is presently
available. (continues,
including several more reviews...)
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The
opinions expressed in this column are those of the reviewer
and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the
editors or the publishers of this
magazine.
RADIO & TELEVISION NEWS
©
Copyright 1956 Radio TV News -- All Rights Reserved.
Transcription and HTML version ©
Copyright 2001 Wendy Carlos
Comment:
And this seems to be as far as three-tracks ever went. I
never learned why Mercury and the other companies mentioned
never took this to the next stage. We can assume that two
track stereo provided enough problems for listeners less
than two years after these columns were written. Bert wrote
a second column for the same magazine starting a year later,
called "Sound on Tape." It reviewed the newest stereo
prerecorded tape medium, which actually could sound very
good. Tapes continued for many years, giving rise to
prerecorded cassettes and good old eight-track cartridges.
But stereo LP's became the major release medium for stereo,
and it couldn't provide three distinct channels in any
direct fashion. The center channel, by the way, has remained
ignored until the newest 5.1 surround disks appeared, DTS,
Dolby Digital, and now DVD-A's. Used well the C channel
fills the front of the soundfield nicely, and is a worthy
addition that has been waiting in the wings for only half a
century!
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