How a Columbia Record is Made (1928 Silent Film)

[transformingArt]

[youtubehq]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W53txQbHYHE[/youtubehq]
[youtubehq]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdy6sjsL9wo[/youtubehq]
[youtubehq]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PS_8YOJElHU[/youtubehq]
[youtubehq]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ofdS_2Hx6I[/youtubehq]

This is one of the earliest film describing the whole process of making a record. I have seen a British Pathé newsreel about making a HMV record circa 1918, but the whole process is much more well-documented on here.

I'm sure Stravinsky is conducting his Firebird suite, as the person who posted this video pointed out, there's three harps visible in the footage. I actually have that record in my collection, so I'm thinking of the idea to synchronize the footage with the actual recording. (I have done it on my Charlie Chaplin record video)

[estott]

You might be able to synchronize bits of it quite well, like the harp and xylophone clips.

[Lenoirstreetguy]

These are just great! I commented on them on the 78L message board and I'll tell you what I said:
I find it odd( and kind of disappointing ) that there are no pictures of W S Purser who was the Columbia
technical head at this time. I suspect too that the amp that they are
fiddling with may not in fact be the one they are using to make the
records. It may be one left over from Purser's experiments during 1924-25
when he was developing his own electrical recording system that ultimately
was not used as the WE system was deemed superior.
And if you look carefully at the
recording lathe scenes you will see that they consist of shots of two
different studios edited so it appears to be the some one. The " eccentric
amp" is in shot number two which makes me wonder all the more if it in fact was a Western Electric product at all .
And of course in those days neither HMV or Columbia wanted to give away any trade secrets even if they both were supposedly using the same system. As we know Columbia was assiduously experimenting in order to develop a system of their own which would be as good as, or superior to, that of Western Electric. Under the direction of Alan Blumlein they succeeded, and freed themselves( and ultimately EMI) from the royalties levied by Western Electric.
And looking at the pressing plant: can you imagine any more boring work than running a record press?
Jim

[spin78's]

What a process! I can imagine the odor in that building was pretty strong.

[recordo]

Thanks for posting this fascinating film here - I love watching these films!

Here is a link to the RCA Victor film, "Command Performance" from 1942 which shows the processes as they occurred in the 1940s (just in case it was missed on its own thread).

http://glennamer.com/amer/Command_Performance.html

[scullylathe]

The lathe in the images looks like a Blumlein gravity machine (with the attached wax-destroying mechanical playback arm and horn) with a Western Electric D-spec field coil recorder mounted. This is an older style lathe where the recording media passes under the recorder and not the other way round as with more modern machines where the recorder is mounted on a sled or carriage and moves across the surface of the blank. Neither shot shows the Blumlein recorder and yes, that's not a WE recording amp rack. Also interesting how they're still using graphite treatment prior to plating and tie a conducting wire around the blank which creates a droopy looking, bowl-shaped negative. Do you know if this film was made in England or the States? Who produced it?

[frenchmarky]

Seems to be a hose mounted above the wax disc while it is recording, is that either a vacuum or a blower hose to remove bits of wax as it is recording?
Wow, three harps, very very impressive! One takes many things for granted... you hold an old record in your hands and have no idea of all the work and materials and ingenuity and workers it took to produce it. I imagine a miniscule percentage of people back in the early 1900's had even an inkling of what it required to make these seemingly simple discs.
Thanks for the very interesting videos!

[Kirkwood]

My thanks as well for putting up these links, it was a great series to watch and a great way to learn that much more about this fascinating hobby. After watching these films, I have a whole new appreciation for the finished product. Think of all that work of so many hands to produce the final product! This makes it harder for me to throw a record away.

I, too, had wondered if this was filmed in the USA or England. The scene at the end, where the young ladies put the latest Columbia record on the turntable and start to dance----that Columbia doesn't look like the US Viva-Tonals of the late 1920s. It's a very pretty console cabinet with vaguely Queen Anne Period-model look to it, and I had thought that by this late date the USA Columbia was no longer producing the Art models. Maybe this was a more common standard model in the UK market. That glimpse of the playing compartment is fairly grainy and brief, so a positive identification is difficult. But---whether it was filmed in England or the US, it's a great rare look into the past.

[JHolmesesq]

Those labels look like the UK Columbia branch, and the shots of the town are very reminiscent of early 20th century British streets to me, tightly packed terraced housing surrounding the local factory.

[Lenoirstreetguy]

Oh, I don't think there's any question of it not being in England! The " Eton crop" hairdo worn by the wax girl is one of many dead givaways. This is why I mention W S Purser who was the technical head of British Columbia. The Stravinsky scenes are filmed in France and not only that but I think the dance band recording room scene is the French staff of the Columbia company, although the the conductor looks like Henry Hall. I say this because that series on the great piano players of the past had a segment on the great French pianist Francis Plante. He made records for French Columbia in the late twenties and there are a couple of shots of the recording staff. They are definitely the ones seen in this clip: the chap with the nose is unmistakable >
I think the London studio was in the Petty France ares of central London, but I don't offhand know where the pressing plant was located. Arthur Brooks was the managing director. He was universally popular with the artists, and played rather the same role with Columbia that Fred Gaisberg did at HMV. There seems to be very little written about him post-merger and I rather wonder if he were bested by Gaisberg like in the old westerns" ...this town ain't big enough for the two of us.."

Jim