Columbia Viva-Tonal 611

[pierre1778]

Thanks to everyone... I've learned a lot of what I needed to know here.

#1 Tracking vs. weight being the real issue. If I get this 611, I'll make sure the soundbox has been or gets rebuilt properly

#2 And Marco, I appreciate your details about the 611 tonearm and soundbox, and about wear in general. I've been using a Brunswick 101 portable for several years and I definitely want a period machine. I've mostly used soft tone needles with the Brunswick, occasionally stretching them to two plays, but no more. And very glad to hear about the high output volume of the 611 too.

#3 Most everything I'll be playing is pre-1940, so that seems OK. And even with my all-time favs, I haven't got close to 100 plays!

Lots of other interesting stuff too... like the "cult of the bass" from the 20s. I'm curious about that...

And here's the thread I originally saw about 611s and record wear... but it's again related to poorly rebuilt reproducers... now I know.

http://forum.talkingmachine.info/viewto ... ard#p66336

[Marco Gilardetti]

I've mostly used soft tone needles with the Brunswick, occasionally stretching them to two plays, but no more. And very glad to hear about the high output volume of the 611 too.

That's all right, but only if you meant that you use the same needle to play both sides of the same record, bacause in most cases the profile of the groove will be nearly identical on each side. But do NOT re-use a needle to play two different records, as the profile of the respective grooves will almost certainly differ from each other, and severe wear may occurr, especially with the first (outermost) grooves. Also, do NOT rotate the needle before playing the second side of a record: leave it in the same position, otherwise sharp edges will almost surely affect the grooves.

Concerning the "cult of the bass" thing, I don't understand in which decade that sentence may have been written. Being born when Hi-Fi had already reached its peak, and thus being accustomed to a very accurate sound reproduction, I can in all sincerity affirm that I have yet to see a gramophone that has "too much bass". Bass response is barely decent, at the best, even in the largest machines ever made. The aperture of the horn's mouth and the diameter of the diaphragm are in any case too small to give a flat frequency response in the lower end of the audible spectrum. (As a side note, the horn's mouth size, being a physical and mathematical limit to frequency response, still limits many contemporary horn-loaded speakers, which have only a mediocre extension in the bass end of the spectrum).

So, on one hand I'm not suprised at all that technicians of the 20's tried to address this issue, at least to some degree, as it was so obvious that gramophones lacked bass frequencies. And on the other hand I can hardly understand why anyone would complain that they did so. I would like to read the original article and see which was the context. As it is, it sounds pretty nonsense.

[OrthoFan]

...Concerning the "cult of the bass" thing, I don't understand in which decade that sentence may have been written.

That would go back to the late 1920s or early 1930s. It's been about three or four decades since I read that, and now, I'm unsure of the exact source--whether it was in a book or an old magazine article. I'm thinking, I might have spotted the remark in "From Tin Foil to Stereo" (1977 re-printing) where an exchange between Compton MacKenzie and a colleague at "The Gramophone" was quoted, at length. (I also thought it might have come from "The Gramophone Handbook," which was published in 1931. MacKenzie wrote the foreword to the book.)

If I remember right, MacKenzie was a proponent of acoustic reproduction, which he felt projected more of the "spirit" of the music, while a colleague favored electrical reproduction, which reproduced the "body and blood" of the music. When I have some free time, I'll try to locate my copy of "From Tin Foil to Stereo" and cull through the pages--there are hundreds and hundreds.

Apparently, MacKenzie held some strong opinions and got into a number of exchanges when he worked for the Gramophone -- http://www.gramophone.co.uk/features/fo ... -put-downs

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Back on topic -- one thing I'm wondering about the Viva-Tonal 611; does it have the same size horn used in the Victor Consolette, or is it larger?

OF

[Oceangoer1]

Back on topic -- one thing I'm wondering about the Viva-Tonal 611; does it have the same size horn used in the Victor Consolette, or is it larger?

OF

I believe they are similar in size, but they are different shapes. (I have both a 611 and a Colony, which uses the same horn as the Consolette)

The 611 is shorter in length (from the tonearm), but is a tad more wide, more like a rectangle. The Consolette horn is closer to a square, but longer in length. The wood on the Conoslette horn is much thicker.

The 611 horn looks exponential, but I'm not sure if it is a true exponential horn.

[OrthoFan]

I believe they are similar in size, but they are different shapes. (I have both a 611 and a Colony, which uses the same horn as the Consolette)

The 611 is shorter in length (from the tonearm), but is a tad more wide, more like a rectangle. The Consolette horn is closer to a square, but longer in length. The wood on the Conoslette horn is much thicker.

The 611 horn looks exponential, but I'm not sure if it is a true exponential horn.

Many thanks.

OF

[bigshot]

Bigshot, I think the problem you had with those records is not due to the fiber needles themselves, but to the fact that some users of fiber needles also have the (questionable) habit of coating the records with paraffin to lubricate them..

That could totally be it. After I washed the records and let them dry overnight and into the next day, the gunk in the grooves was still wet. The steel needle kicked up stuff that looked like leaves in a rain gutter after a solid month of rain. It was a nasty brown organic slop- probably paraffin and worn off bits of fiber needles ground into a mush. I've never seen anything like it. The records looked brand new but they played very rough. If the person who owned them had just played them with a normal steel needle, they probably would have sounded great still.

[pierre1778]

That's all right, but only if you meant that you use the same needle to play both sides of the same record, bacause in most cases the profile of the groove will be nearly identical on each side. But do NOT re-use a needle to play two different records, as the profile of the respective grooves will almost certainly differ from each other, and severe wear may occurr, especially with the first (outermost) grooves. Also, do NOT rotate the needle before playing the second side of a record: leave it in the same position, otherwise sharp edges will almost surely affect the grooves.

Yes... 99% of the time it's been the same needle for both sides. But I know I've occasionally switched records, so I'm very glad to know that! Looking forward to seeing and hearing the 611 tomorrow...

[Marco Gilardetti]

If I remember right, MacKenzie was a proponent of acoustic reproduction, which he felt projected more of the "spirit" of the music, while a colleague favored electrical reproduction, which reproduced the "body and blood" of the music. When I have some free time, I'll try to locate my copy of "From Tin Foil to Stereo" and cull through the pages--there are hundreds and hundreds.

Thanks for the details! Well, although I would still like to read how he substantiated (or at least he tried to...) his point with his own words, don't get mad looking for it. It's now pretty clear that he looked into the matter from a nosthalgic viewpoint. He got the feeling that a "cult of the bass" was developing mainly because the bass delivered by electromagnetic pick-ups and speakers was - simply put - never heard before on gramophones, while it was so easily delivered by a quality radiogram.

Please note that, while I criticise him, I understand him deeply at the same time. I perfectly know that attitude of defending an era and a technology that you loved so much and that brought you much joy, and that awful feeling of seeing it vanish before your eyes. But the gramophones were to loose the match against radiograms on all points.

Except perhaps one: emotions. I have the feeling that *some* records played on *some* gramophones deliver an outstanding emotional energy that goes directly to your nerves and bones, almost bypassing your ears. The same record played on a (more accurate from all point of views) radiogram or Hi-Fi system seems to be absolutely unable to express tha same emotional message. Although I ignore the reason, I have tested this with friends and relatives (none of whom are gramophone enthusiasts nor Hi-Fi fanatics) and basically all of them agreed that a gramophone can be unbelievably emotional.

[OrthoFan]

He got the feeling that a "cult of the bass" was developing mainly because the bass delivered by electromagnetic pick-ups and speakers was - simply put - never heard before on gramophones, while it was so easily delivered by a quality radiogram.

Hi Marco:

I finally located the "cult of the bass" quotation, which appears on page 354, "From Tin Foil to Stereo" by Oliver Read and Walter Welch, 1976 edition. It's originally from an exchange that took place between Compton Mackenzie, editor of the Gramophone, and P. Wilson, the magazine's technical expert, and was published in the magazine in 1935. Mr. Wilson had taken exception to some comments that Mr. Mackenzie made in a previous issue, and the "cult of the bass" remark was actually made by Mr. Wilson, not Mr. Mackenzie, as I had thought.

As I noted, I last read the book about 40 years ago, and my memory was a bit foggy about some of the details. Upon re-reading the chapter I found that by "cult of the bass," Mr. Wilson was actually speaking about the quality of electrically amplified gramophones available in the UK market at the time.


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"As late as the spring of 1935, the editor of the Gramophone, Compton Mackenzie had let loose a blast at the growing incursion of all-electric reproducing instruments, as follows:

'Of one thing only am I completely certain at this moment, which is that the really passionate devotee of the gramophone for a long time to come will get more pleasure out of his instrument if it is acoustical, and I am even going to add hand-wound, than if it is electrical. This is not a question of sour grapes. I challenge any reader who possesses the finest electrical gramophone to capture the spirit of the music as successfully as the owner of a Mark b, and Expert Senior or a Cascade.' ..." ("From Tinfoil to Stereo," page 353)

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A very lengthy response from Mr. Wilson followed, addressing all of Mr. Mackenzie's points, one by one. Here's a small part of it:


MR WILSON's response:
"...I would gladly take up the Editor's challenge and introduce him to not one but a number of radio-gramophones which would give him the 'spirit of the music' in full measure, but I cannot do it in the Outer Hebrides. (The Editor's home.)...

...I do not like many of the radio-gramophones that are on the market today. I find it intolerable to listen to some of them even for half an hour, let alone to live with them for an extended period. The cult of the bass has been going on for some ten years now, and until recently things were going steadily from bad to worse. And in this connection I must remind the Editor that the 'Expert Committee' was almost alone at the beginning in their protests against the growing fashion. What is the good of having bass if it is a boomy, or a plummy or fluffy or a shushy bass? ... " ("From Tinfoil to Stereo," page 354)

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"From Tin Foil to Stereo," originally published in 1959, and again in 1976, was once regarded as the "Bible" of the phonograph hobby. Though some of the information has been since found to be inaccurate--and the book has been criticized because of it's strong "Edison bias"--it still provides a comprehensive history of the development of the phonograph and recording industry. Used copies still surface today, at various prices -- http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?autho ... t=sr&ac=qr


OrthoFan

[Marco Gilardetti]

We can quickly return on-topic by asking to pierre1778 some nice pictures of his new Columbia 611! There are not many pictures of this specific model available, and I would be very glad to see some good and detailed ones!

OrthoFan, thanks once again for the quotations from the original text. It's amusing how, although it was not Mackenzie to introduce the "cult of the bass" subject, nonetheless he has proven to be nostalgic indeed. Should people have to wind up a crank to listen to music (as he writes), most probably 99% of people wouldn't listen to anything at all today. Although, again, I understand his point and I agree with him that a pause to rewind the spring, while you rest your ears and rethink about what you have freshly listened to, is all but useless. Same goes for turning the side of an LP. But, again, I am perhaps nostalgic under many aspects, just as he was.

Should you have the time and the means of scanning the point by point call-and-response between Mackenzie and Wilson, I'd be very glad to read the respective arguments. By the way, that would also be the opportunity to propose the discussion in a specific thread.

As for "From Tin Foil to Stereo" being Edison-oriented, no offense intended to anyone but the United States of America as a whole entity are unbelievably Edison-oriented when seen from afar. I remember expressing my astonishment about this to fellow physicists many years ago, and in reply they explained to me that Edison is (or was) teached in primary school, in a main history chapter, as a sort of national hero, which more or less accounts for the over-reactions of the average American when he perceives that Edison is being criticised by a foreigner.