Rene Vivienne in excerpts from MADAME BUTTERFLY (1908).

[Viva-Tonal]

This record was not a quick, easy transfer. The music is almost all very soft, made even harder to discern because of the limitations of acoustic recording.

This record is in very good condition indeed for a 100 year old disc, but the noises typical of such a record seem louder in this case, due to the lower overall volume level of the recording.

The disc was already very clean. It sounded the most 'on key' to me at 75.75 rpm. I transferred it to my Masterlink at this speed through the modified Crown IC-150A preamp, using its filters and tone controls to obtain as natural and low-noise a reproduction as possible going into the digital realm. Once there, to best minimise stray ticks and other noises, I divided the recording into smaller sections, some of them only a fraction of a second in duration. Each segment was treated to careful limiting that would only clip off the spikes of 'ticks' whilst leaving the music's dynamics untouched. There were over 50 such small sections made and individually treated by this process, requiring several hours of labour to complete.

After this, the sections were then rejoined to make one proper track. Fades for the head and tail of the track, and further filtering and equalisation were added, to refine and polish the sound, and reduce unwanted sounds below and above the frequency range of the recording.

Click on the label to hear the result.



It is my understanding Columbia did not do well with classical music recordings for quite some time; not until perhaps the World War 1 era did they begin to have anything approaching Victor in this realm. For one thing, Victor managed to sign most of the biggest stars to its Red Seal division, so there wasn't always too many others left.

Vivienne here sounds alright, but what's up with the chorus behind her? There's a cough in one place, and several instances where they are quite out of tune behind her. (Did they think no-one would hear those problems on the players of the day?) Perhaps things like this were among the reasons Columbia ran a poor second with classical releases early on....

[richardh]

Wow, there is certainly attention to detail in transferring this disk. I usually catch up on music postings over the weekends (as I usually stay up late with a pair of comfy headphones and listen to the music without interruptions), howeve just glaning at the effort put into this one...well I just had to listen to the result now.

Transferring early acoustic disks is tricky for the reasons outlined - high surface noise and low recording levels - but I think this one comes across great and I think you have struck the right balance between removing surface noise and keeping the acoustics of the performance intact. Would be interesting though to hear what the recording would sound like with the tick filter cranked up even though it does clip the sound.

Thanks for posting.

RJ

[Wolfe]

Those faintly recorded acoustics can be hard to try to wring the music out of, looks like you succeeded in your effort.

The perfomance isn't bad bad either, but yeah, that cough really sticks out! Whoever did it didn't even bother to lean way from the horn.

This sounds like something that could have originally been a rehearsal take to establish sound balance, etc. and it was accidentally issued.

[operabass78s]

Interesting disc. The cough is definitely not subtle. Of course acoustic recordings have never been treasure troves of great choral music. The chorus is OK, The low Bb seems to be a tuning issue, especially when the ensemble is dropping down a fifth or such. Other than that it's not bad considering the circumstances. I've sung the Humming Chorus once, and honestly (I don't know if there are any other choral singers here) unison is one of the most difficult things to sing, having to keep exactly in tune on the same pitch in the same timbre as the rest of the ensemble (probably around 6 people in this recording I would guess). All in all a pretty decent and interesting disc, if not only for the cough right next to the horn. Columbia supremacy at its finest.

[WDC]

I actually don't know why but I do enjoy such imperfect recordings very, very much. The cough is absolutely great, such as the other problems. It gives funny attitude to otherwise serious music. Maybe this antagonism is what fascinates me. Thank you for posting it!

[Lenoirstreetguy]

This is great...for all the wrong reasons The tuning passes until that final note where one of the altos completely loses any sense of the key. Your pitching, though is fine.
Speaking of sketchy performances, I have an Okeh acoustic of the Waltzes from Strauss' Der Rosenkavalier which defies description. It was from an Odeon master and merciful heavens it's bad...or hysterically funny depending on your point of view.

Jim

[Viva-Tonal]

Thanks, everyone--glad I got by with this one! (It's take 2 by the way.)

[beaumonde]

Viva-tonal, have you tried ClickRepair? It is probably the best (for the money) noise reduction tool out there, and is very reasonably priced ($35 I think, but extra for the deNoise dihisser). It is much, much easier than manually separating out and declicking individual fragments of the recording.

Thanks for posting this, in any case. Amazing the things that were approved for release!

[WDC]

Well, as Adam pointed it out I think I should post my derived version. I just did this for myself to see how good I could get it. I removed the crackles with Sony NR and most of the rumble with NR filter from Audition 3:

http://www.box.net/shared/3xig9vdfcg

[Viva-Tonal]

Viva-tonal, have you tried ClickRepair? It is probably the best (for the money) noise reduction tool out there, and is very reasonably priced ($35 I think, but extra for the deNoise dihisser). It is much, much easier than manually separating out and declicking individual fragments of the recording.

That most likely doesn't work with a Mac....it's not like I have to wind this thing and use a new steel needle each time, but this iMac I have is old. (About 2001 vintage. When is the last time you saw one with a CRT?) It won't play or record DVDs, nor will it record CDs.