The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

I bought a pile of 78's today, and I was very shocked to find in the middle of the box 2 acetate recordings. I was even more surprised to see that they were King Oliver's Creole Jazz band.

Whilst I am becoming increasingly more adept in my 78 knowledge, I'm afraid that my knowledge on acetates is next to nothing. A few internet searches tell me that these discs were made as home recordings (One has a private recording label on it, the other a master sound system label). I daren't play them as I have read that acetates wear down terribly quickly - and since it's such a rare band to find on any record I'd prefer them to stay intact as possible.

I'm intending to sell these ones off. Since they're not represses I have a feeling that they might be worth a bit more than the average 78, am I correct in this thinking? Also, if anyone has any grading advice for acetates then feel free to enlighten me!

Sorry, I forgot to mention the titles are:

High Societiy Rag / Buddy's Habits

I Ain't Gonna Tell Nobody / Room Rent Blues

Not having them in hand, I suspect they are dubs from acoustic originals, either private or studio/radio station in origin. Probably not valuable or collectible but may be interesting to hear.

Here in Australia they would indeed be collectible, and I dont think I've seen an acetate of any kind sell on ebay for under $20 or $30. I have no idea what the UK market is like though.
I see no reason not to play acetates using modern equiptment, but never use an acoustic machine.

beaumonde wrote:Not having them in hand, I suspect they are dubs from acoustic originals, either private or studio/radio station in origin. Probably not valuable or collectible but may be interesting to hear.

That would be my guess too.

I don't think acetate was in use during the years those records were waxed. Barring them from being original test records or the like.

I agree that they're dubs. The band I believe only recorded up to 1923 or 24; Oliver himself stopped recording in 1931 - 3 years before the lacquer disc was marketed and it would be a number of years before lacquers were used as masters for production of metal work.

Ah right, thanks a lot

This whole notion of home recording does interest me now though. Whenever I've seen photos of cutting lathes they have previously been large bulky machines - did they ever shrink enough to be used in the home?

Oh yes, many companies made home recorders and I'm sure there were models marketed in the UK. They're not "common" common, but they aren't rarities either. US brand names were Recordio (Wilcox-Gay Corporation), Masco, Record-O-Fone (Bell Sound Systems), Phon-O-Cord (Packard Bell), Meissner, etc. The mail order companies Montgomery Ward and Sears marketed their own "house" machines; Silvertone for Sears - not sure that the MW model had a 'brand' other than the company name. Also Presto and Rek-O-Kut were larger manufacturers whose semi-professional machines were also bought for home use.

If you come across such a machine, especially a dual tonearm model, many times the crystals in the cutting head and pickup are bad and need to be replaced. There is a company in West Virginia that does this. Some models had magnetic cutters, but almost always the pickup was crystal as was common during the years these machines were made. The problem being that rochelle salt based crystals were used that were vulnerable to moisture absorption over time. Later crystal units were built with ceramic piezo elements which aren't affected by moisture.

I might add that there were also early radio sets for the home marketed by RCA Victor in the US (not sure about the UK) that would record on pre-grooved plastic blanks. Quality wasn't very good because the needle used simply 'displaced' and attempted to re-shape the existing groove with the incoming sound signal, but they did "work". The other machines mentioned used standard blank discs and had some sort of feed mechanism to provide groove spacing during recording.

scullylathe wrote:Oh yes, many companies made home recorders and I'm sure there were models marketed in the UK. They're not "common" common, but they aren't rarities either. US brand names were Recordio (Wilcox-Gay Corporation).

Recordio even had a cheap little acoustic recording attachment/set-up they were marketing, around 1940.

A small recording horn + arm/diaphragm/stylus contraption that was made to use with basically any existing record player. Not entirely sure what kind of records it cut to. Wax, perhaps?

Ad copy even made claims for it 'being able to record off the radio' (by positioning it in front of a loudpeaker) though the quality would have had to be abysmal.

I'm not aware of a Wilcox-Gay product like that; they never manufactured purely acoustic devices. What you describe sounds like a Fay Voice Recorder or one of those toy "recorder" devices that were available about that time. Do you have a photo of this device? Would be interesting if it is something made by W-G.