Charlie Chaplin Conducts The Abe Lyman Orchestra

[Paal1994]

Here's a interesting video I found on YouTube. This is the great Charlie Chaplin conducting Abe Lynman's Orchestra in 1925.
The songs they are playing is "Sing a Song" and "With You Dear, in Bombay". Both composed by Chaplin.

Paal.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eA6j_SFy47k[/youtube]

[Wolfe]

Thanks for posting that.

There's a picture in there of Chaplin and the band in front of an acoustic recording setup. That was actually filmed as well. Some of it appeared in Kevin Brownlow and David Gill's 'Unknown Chaplin' documentary.

I don't know if the actual released record was cut at that session, but in the documentary they synched the film with the record and they aligned perfectly. I imagine the equipment and band were brought to Chaplin's studio to do this.

I'd like to see the whole thing someday, if it's out there. There aren't any other films of acoustic recording sessions (real or simulated) that I know of.

[Paal1994]

Wolfe,

I have also seen the little part of it that they used in the documentary.
I agree that the equipment would have been brought over to Chaplin's studios. Since it's from 1925, he would probably have his hands full with "The Gold Rush" that he did not have time to make the trip to Brunswick's studios.

I know of one other filmed acoustic recording session. But that only lasts a few seconds. It part of a British Pathé movie, "How records are made". I would also like to see the whole film of the recording session. Instead of the short clip used in "Unknown Chaplin"

Paal.

[Wolfe]

I figure the band and equipment would have been brought over to Chaplin, for the reason that proper exposure on the film and resultant focus/quality of the photography would have been better acheived in Chaplin's studio than trying to wedge a camera in some windowless acoustic recording studio and film there.

Film required a lot of light in those days and in 1925, I think many studios were still using natural(sunlight)to film.
They could have used an arc lamp but imagine the heat and discomfort one would have generated in a (presumably small) airless acoustic recording studio.
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There is also that 1890's Edison film of the fellow playing violin into the horn of a cylinder recorder.
That film and cylinder have been synched together and is out on some DVD or another.

It's more a curio than a real document of a recording session.

[Lenoirstreetguy]

Hollywood did a couple of simulated acoustic sessions: a bad one in The Great Caruso and one that isn't bad in Two Sisters From Boston( 1946) . In the latter Lauritz Melchior is seen in a studio scene that's fairly accurate...with the requisite hamming up of the orchestra for laugh value. But one of the players is actually using a Stroh violin so somebody had a good memory of the not so distant past . This is another one of those movies done in the 1940's set at the turn of the 20th century. This was the nostalgia factor at work : kind of the 40's version of the Mad Men syndrome.
Maybe this url will work
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6e9b8QH ... L&index=17

The thing is that in 1946, when the movie was made, the last acoustics had been cut only 16 years before, and Melchior himself began his recording career in the acoustic studio. And one of MGM's top studio violinists at this time was Lou Raderman: the one who's ravishing playing you can hear on all those acoustic Victor Salon Orchestra recordings.
There is another acoustic set up in March of Time short about jazz. I'll hunt for it.

Jim

[Paal1994]

Jim,

That's a very interesting video!
Could Lou Raderman possibly be related to Harry Raderman?

Paal.