How do you listen to Old Music ?

[Marc Hildebrant]

Group,

A number of years ago, I discovered that quite a bit of the music recorded by Edison and Victor did not get reproduced using the original playback equipment. While the music was at times recorded quite well, the playback equipment left much of the music behind. This was a motivation to use various software methods to remove distortion from worn records and using today's equipment, hear more of what was recorded.

Yet, it seems that playback of this old songs is often preferred on the original equipment. Case in point is my posting of My blue Heaven. The cleaned-up music is on a CD and can be heard on today's equipment, yet YouTube video's get many "hits" when the playback equipment is original.

What say you? Do you prefer the original sound, or the ability to hear a clean, extended frequency range to the song?

Marc

[VanEpsFan1914]

I like my Brunswick Panatrope.

It has a nice big horn and a wider, more compliant diaphragm, so even with pre-'25 acoustics it can wring out the sound to make it better. If I were listening on line I would probably enjoy hearing the cleaned-up digital remasterings you make, or if I had real sense I'd burn CDs and play them while driving the car.

For the most of my antique music I just play it on a 1912 Edison A-200 or a 1928 Brunswick 15-8 but that's just the way it is. Not an audiophile and not a serious collector, just happen to very much enjoy how economical and pleasurable the old wind-up phonograph can be for listening to music.

[drh]

...What say you? Do you prefer the original sound, or the ability to hear a clean, extended frequency range to the song?

I occasionally do comparative or illustrative videos featuring antique machines. In general, though, for my own listening pleasure:

Lateral cut: Modern equipment all the way, both on sonic grounds and because I don't want to cause further damage to shellac records by inflicting heavily tracking metal needles on them. What I've heard of thorn needles, admittedly of limited extent, has not impressed me. I do keep a small stock of common, less-than-pristine disks for those occasions when I get the yen to listen to an acoustic machine.

Vertical cut disks: I long was of the opinion that modern gear, at least that readily available to the home audio hobbyist, did not yield results to match those achievable with well-restored vintage machines of the types for which the records were intended. Recent developments have me beginning to question the continued validity of that conclusion, but until I get my Pathé players back into service (undergoing repairs at the moment) and take the time to sit down and do some serious comparative listening with them and my Edison machines, the jury remains out.

Cylinders: With the advent of the Wilson Home player, electronic cylinder playback has become truly practical for the home hobbyist. That machine has its limitations, but it's nonetheless become my predominant way of playing cylinder records, although I have no plans to shed my Edison Triumph, which I do still enjoy playing from time to time, or my Amberola 75, which provides cylinder storage, if nothing else. When I do play the older machines, I limit myself to celluloid cylinders to avoid causing needless wear to fragile wax.

[epigramophone]

I am at heart a machine collector who also collects good records to play on them.
For me the fascination of our hobby is listening to records played on the machines for which they were designed.
I have heard old records played on modern equipment, and for me there is always something missing.
If I want to hear Caruso, for example, on modern equipment I play one of the excellent CD transfers available.
I also play CD compilations of 1920's jazz and dance band music for company when in my workshop.

I do not obsess about record wear. I have records from my father's (1914-2010) and grandfather's (1885-1963) collections which show no visible signs of wear from playing with steel needles, because they changed the needles at the recommended intervals and "ran in" the points for a few revolutions before they entered the recorded grooves.

Like vintage cars, gramophones and phonographs need regular gentle use to keep them running well.

[CarlosV]

I am at heart a machine collector who also collects good records to play on them.
For me the fascination of our hobby is listening to records played on the machines for which they were designed.

I share Roger's opinion: I collect both machines and records, and to me the fun is to play the records on the vintage machines. Of course modern transcriptions are more "analytical" - to utilize a fashionable term in the hifi world - but to my ears they are like wearing an armature with jeans: it is a mismatch. The limitations of old machines are compatible with those of their contemporary recording technologies. There is not much more music to be heard out of a Caruso record than what you can hear on a good acoustical machine like an EMG. I have thousands of modern transcriptions of all kinds of music, in LPs and CDs - most sound good and practical to listen to, but just do not give me the same satisfaction of playing a pristine 100-year old record in my old machine. As to wear, I mostly utilize thorn needles - they do not produce any noticeable wear on most types of records. Even steel needles, if of good quality and when properly replaced after one play like Roger indicated, will not create any significant wear over hundreds of plays. Having written that, I know there is no correct answer to the topic question: I am sure Marc has lots of fun cleaning up and enhancing the sound of the old records (with excellent results), possibly more than playing them on an Edison machine. The discussion is similar to the current debate among hifi enthusiasts in which some prefer the sound of LPs that compress the sound over digital DSD transcriptions that are theoretically perfect: the arguments are always subjective, with words like warm, less tiresome etc to substantiate the preferences, simply because listening is a subjective and variable experience.

[JerryVan]

I like my music to sound today, as it sounded 100 years ago. It's my tiny bit of "time travel" to experience these sounds as they were in the past. It's the same when I drive my Model T on a vacant country road and can see no outward signs of the modern world. I also appreciate anything designed 100+ years ago, that still works and can still do the job it was designed to do. In the case of phonographs, they can still entertain just as when they were new.

[emgcr]

I share the well-expressed opinions of Roger, Carlos and Jerry. I have never experienced more satisfying reproduction from any gramophone than an Oversize EMG Xb which blew my mind when I first heard one twenty-five years ago and continues to do so every day---unbelievable quality of sound. I also admire the amazing output from the tiny HMV 101 and 102 gramophones which I use for picnics in vintage cars and for where moving a larger machine would be impractical---like last week's VE Day celebrations. There are only so many hours in a day so, although it would be fun to collect many different machines, I have to be sensible and stick with the most satisfying in terms of my own musical experience which, as has been previously said, will always be subjective. I also very much enjoy the restoration process which I find intensely satisfying.

[edisonplayer]

The machines I play are my Triumph,my C250 Diamond Disc,and my Victrola XI.I like the feel of hearing old music on them.Also my Credenza.edisonplayer

[Orchorsol]

Again, very similar to Roger, Carlos, Jerry and Graham. The sense of 'event' and visceral joy of hearing old music via a superb gramophone is incomparable.

[Marc Hildebrant]

Group,

Thanks for the comments.

Marc