The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I've never seen this mis-label. 30001 is a 40-minute record, yet this copy has the 24-minute label on it. My copy of 30001 has the correct 40-minute label. Has anyone else observed this?

Because it's faulty, I'd be happy to buy it from you. (cool record & mistake) Jerry B.

Not mine; mine is correct. eBay Item #321064238042

I have always been kinda fascinated by Edison's Long Play system. I heard he only released a couple titles? Were there alot of LP titles available? Edison in someways was very advanced for his time.

Victrolacollector wrote:I have always been kinda fascinated by Edison's Long Play system. I heard he only released a couple titles? Were there alot of LP titles available? Edison in someways was very advanced for his time.

From my understanding, there were very few titles. Along with that, they were all dubs, had low volume, and the thin groove walls broke down quickly.

I wonder if it would have worked if another stringer material had been used, along with direct recording rather than dubs (so that they would sound good while also working).

ImperialGuardsman wrote:

Victrolacollector wrote:I have always been kinda fascinated by Edison's Long Play system. I heard he only released a couple titles? Were there alot of LP titles available? Edison in someways was very advanced for his time.

From my understanding, there were very few titles. Along with that, they were all dubs, had low volume, and the thin groove walls broke down quickly.

I wonder if it would have worked if another stringer material had been used, along with direct recording rather than dubs (so that they would sound good while also working).

From what i read in Frow, they had so many technical difficulties in cutting these, they couldn't manage direct recording, and had to resort to dubbing...

Bill

The Edison Long Playing records are certainly fascinating and a tremendous technical achievement for their day. The main problem with them, apart from the fragility of the groove walls (although I believe both Frow and Gelatt overstate this as with a decent stylus and a bit of care, they will play satisfactorily), was the actual music recorded. The adverising puff from the Edison company at the time suggested that there would be complete acts from operas and whole movements from symphonies but unfortunately these never matrialised and instead one got the usual standard Edison fare of selections seemingly chosen at random.
The only record to really exploit the 20 minute playing time was 30004 with the complete Nutcracker Suite on one side, although it is dubbed from Edison standard discs and yes, you can hear the joins!
The actual sound is also very thin, especially so when compared to the contemporary electrical recording put out by other companies - imagine a dubbed Blue Amberol but with only half the volume and that is pretty much the sound on the discs. By far the best recordings are the first two 10 inch issues, 10001 and 10002, which were dubbed from specially recorded masters, other than that the recordings are pretty ropey.
I don't have any sales figures but Frow suggests they were a financial disaster and the fact that only 14 were ever issued tends to support that view, although the records do turn up every now and again even in the UK.
Despite all their manifest flaws, I find the Edison Long Playing records to be fascinating and frequently just sit down and listen to one, marvelling at the technical brilliance but sad that such an opportunity to record decent music without a side break in 1926/1927 was sadly missed.

Tim W-W

Just thought I'd let you and other Edison Long Play enthusiasts know that I'm about to join your ranks. Have found most of the needed hardware with George Vollema and hope to be up and playing in a couple weeks (upgrading my Edison S-19). Then I can try to chase down the records in the months ahead.

I've read all the cautionary tales about thin groove walls, soft volume, pedestrian material, etc. None of that spooks me. I'm just prepared to be amazed to hear an antique phonograph play for longer than four minutes.

Oh, BTW, I've already upgraded the S-19 to a double spring, so no deficiency there.

Ralph

Would you record folks recommend playing an Edison LP on a Diamond Disk or is there a better method? Jerry

Jerry B. wrote:Would you record folks recommend playing an Edison LP on a Diamond Disk or is there a better method? Jerry

I have one mint 12" specimen that I wanted to hear, so once I played it on a modern turnable with cross-wired stereo cartridge tracking as light as possible, probably at 1 gram. If I wanted to hear an LP on an original machine, I would buy a record in lesser condition and keep my mint record mint.