Haven't posted anything here for awhile, so 2 questions

[jboger]

I bought quite a few 78s yesterday--maybe 200. One of the records is of Cal Stewart, not identified as Uncle Josh, but playing the same character. He sings "I may be old but I'm awfully tough." This is on the Victor batwing label. It so happens I have the same recording on an Edison cylinder. There he is, dear old Uncle Josh laughing away at who all knows what, both on cylinder and disk. It seems to me this practice is not done today, that recording contracts today are quite binding. So Q1: am I mistaken in that? Who owned the recording? Were recordings easily traded? (OK, the could be considered 3 questions.)

The second question is more of a machine question but I'll put it here to save space. So we know that many Columbia derivatives have large size spindles and take records with large holes. This has lead to some records having enlarged holes to play on these non-standard machines. Let's flip the coin over and look at the other side. Q2: Was anything made commercially available back in the day to fit over the truly standard small-sized spindle so that a Victor, for example, could play these non-standard records with those large central holes? Certainly I could turn something on a lathe to do the job, either out of wood or metal. But that would be a homemade job. I'm asking if anything was actually manufactured and retailed to do this job. If so, I'd like to see what one looks like. I would consider it a good find to pull one out of a junk box at some flea market.

[52089]

The answer to your first question is that in the early days, recording contracts were rarely exclusive. Everybody recorded for everybody who wanted them, frequently re-recording the same selections for multiple companies. You'll find that your 2 Stewart recordings may be extremely similar, but they are definitely not the same recording.

[Wolfe]

Sometimes - like in the ARC family of labels, the same recording will be found on "different" labels. But in the early days the performer just re-recorded the same songs, especially if it had proven a successful record for them with another company . Popular singers like Ada Jones might record the same song for Victor, Columbia and Edison. Probably the performer earned a flat fee for the recording session, instead of a royalty on record sales. I don't know which artists in the early days actually earned royalties on individual records, unless they were in a special exalted level of celebrity, like Enrico Caruso or Francesco Tamagno. The song composer and / or publishing company that owned the printed music collected mechanical royalties when their songs were recorded by whatever record label.

[OrthoFan]

... I'm asking if anything was actually manufactured and retailed to do this job. If so, I'd like to see what one looks like. I would consider it a good find to pull one out of a junk box at some flea market.

According to the Wikipedia article about Aretino, yes:

"Aretino was started by Arthur J. O’Neill, ... O’Neill also offered adapters for Aretino discs that allowed them to be played on phonographs with a standard spindle, or even on a Busy Bee machine (another O’Neill operation) with its extra spindle hole...." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aretino_Records

I wasn't able to spot an original (antique) adapter, but did find two that are available today --

Aretino Adapter: http://www.shapeways.com/product/23BTDZ ... rd-spindle (Very modern looking -- plastic)

Standard Record Adapter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwxA1foaL5A (Aluminum -- Looks like a Standard spindle.)

OF

[jboger]

So let me see, in the earliest days of the recording industry, artists and performers were mostly free-lancers. They sold specific recordings to whatever record manufacturer would buy them. Seems rather nice. The record company "owned" the recording but not the artist. Later, as the field matured, recording companies and artists entered into exclusive recording contracts. Why? To eliminate competition of course. If you wanted recordings by a specific artist, then you had to buy records from a specific company that held the contract.

Hadn't thought about it that much, but it makes sense. It's the same thing today as it was back then: Captains of industry don't want to encourage competition, they want to eliminate it. Thanks for the responses.

As for my Q2, it seems modern adapters are available, and adapters were made by Aretino back in the day. Still I'd like to see an original period adapter if any exists. Perhaps they go unrecognized for what they are.