The Talking Machine Forum — For All Antique Phonographs & Recordings

Good morning everybody.

Aside from 78 rpm and 80 rpm, which other revolution speeds have been more or less consistently used by record brands?

I recall from previous discussions that early gramophone records used speeds in a range that goes from 70 up to 80 RPMs. Has some of these speeds been used more frequently, or has it been used consistently by some important brand?

On the "other side of the river", french websites claim that Pathé records used many speeds up to 120 revolutions per minute before settling down to the late 80 rpm standard. Again, can some experienced collector also mention which speeds in this range have been used predominantly, or are more important for some technical/historical reason?

Thank you.

I've found that most pre 1920's Victors are actually best at 75-76 rpm. I usually use Billy Murray's voice as my "pitch pipe".

My 1917 Victor Records catalog says all their records should be played at 76.

If my ear suspects a problem at 78, I adjust until the piece is in the known key; whatever rpm that is, is of only passing interest to me. If I don't know the key, I adjust up or down to the nearest most likely key. For example, very few pieces are in "remote" keys like Ab minor (key of seven flats), so I'd adjust up to A minor (faster) or down to G minor (slower), which are both very common keys. Same if a recording puts a piece in some no-man's-land of pitch, in the crack between known keys; in the example above, if the piece seems to be in a very flat Ab or very sharp G, but not settling on either, I'd adjust down to G. If the record has no pitch content, such as speaking voice only, then this method doesn't work, and I'm SOL. And if one has not a musical ear (and a pitch pipe or electronic tuner for such as myself, who isn't blessed or cursed with "perfect pitch," i.e., pitch recognition), then this approach won't work, either. For a lot of people, none of this matters a whole lot, I suspect, but since I'm a musician "I just gotta do it."

Another example: band recordings. Most band music is in flat keys (concert pitch), so if I'm listening to a Sousa march and it's in between F and F sharp, down it goes to F.

I don't want to open up the whole thorny issue of "standard" tuning pitch and all that, which only leads to a morass of speculation and conflicting claims.

52089 wrote:My 1917 Victor Records catalog says all their records should be played at 76.

They shouldn't be. But Victor did use that 74-76 rpm range an awful lot, well into the Orthophonic era.

Columbia favored the 80 (or so) rpm range for many years.

I think Pathé actually settled to 78 rpm in the electrical era, at least the the ones I have appear to play well at that speed (going from memory.)

Brunswick appear to me to play anywhere from like 75 to 80 rpm. I can't think of any period when they seemed to 'settle' on any one speed.

My 1924 HMV catalogue lists speed variations over & below the regular 78rpm, and 81rpm is frequently listed as the correct speed for many recordings.
European Pathé discs tend to be recorded anywhere from 90-100rpm (or it's certainly the case with all the pre-1915 discs I own) & I believe it was only the giant 20" discs that were recorded at 120rpm.

HMV would also at times list speeds on their record labels that were just plainly wrong, as with Caruso. I never expect to trust that (implicitly.)

With Caruso, I rely on Aida Favia-Artsay's book Caruso on Records. I have a bad sense of pitch, so I generally keep the turntable around 76, but I sometimes adjust based on the speed of vibrato of a singer's voice - not a very reliable method, I admit!

As Shane said, early French Pathé discs were recorded at 90-100rpm. This is a photo of the instructions on the sleeve from one of my center-start Pathés:

Okay, so the list so far is as follows:

76 (HMV)
78 (mechanical standard speed)
78,26 (electric standard speed)
80 (HMV, Columbia, Edison, Pathé)
81 (HMV 1924 and around)
90 (European Pathé, lower)
100 (European Pathé, upper)
120 (European Pathé, max.)

Anyone recall any other REFERENCED (not one's ear's preference, thank you) speed which is worth adding?

Nothing below 76 rpm?