Monday, March 26, 2018

Do you hear what I hear?

For as long as I remember my parents had a record of the original Broadway cast recording of Guy and Dolls on Decca Records. It was as thick as a dinner plate and twice as heavy. My parents did not get their first turntable until 1964. Before that the album would have been played on record players.

What is the difference between a turntable and a record player? Well, a turntable is a delicate piece of equipment, A record player takes a girder, attaches a railroad spike to it, and drags the spike through a record. Record players are not healthy to records or other living things.

Needless to say that Guy and Dolls was pretty worn out. By the early ‘70’s, my mother thought it was about time to replace it. Decca Records, at least in the US, had been absorbed by MCA. Since it was the 1970’s, the record company felt that the album just had to be in stereo. To achieve this, the left channel was the straight recording. The right channel was an horrendous reverb. “What’s what’s what’s play play play ing ing ing at at at the the the Rox Rox Rox y y y.”

Other record companies made “simulated” stereo by shifting the phase a little but between channels.

The problem with both of these methods was that if you combined the channels, you would not have the original mono mix. In 1972, Robert Orban patented a new process by which a pseudo-stereo signal could be obtain from a mono source. In essence, the signal was put through a “comb”, spreading different information out over the two channels. Orban’s goal was to be able to recombine the two resulting signals together and obtain the original mono signal. He was successful.

But it still was not stereo. The ability to make something that sounded like true stereo would take until the digital age. DES, or “Digitally Extracted Stereo,” achieves some very amazing results.

I know that there are people who do not like stereo on early recordings, even if there was originally a stereo mix. I can understand that. I like stereo because it allows me to hear different things in the recording that get lost in mono. I have found that there are many subtle things that add to a recording, and I enjoy being able to pick them out.
While you can search for DES examples on You Tube, this site has quite a few without having to search for them. Listen to them, and remember that these were derived from mono recordings. I hope you enjoy them.

13 comments:

  1. I still remember, centered on the top of the album jacket, the word 'STEREO!' surrounded by ruffles & flourishes

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    1. And "Playable on stereophonic equipment only."

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    2. Yes! "Stereo" was a BIG DEAL back then. :)

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    3. I read why that was so important: the vinyl would heat up as the stylus passed through it. A mono stylus only moved in the horizontal plane with no vertical movements. This would "imprint" the information on one side of the groove to the other turning it into a mono record.

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  2. Matt, thanks – I'll check out the DES examples.

    I liked to study digital signal processing in my EE program because I did well in the courses, and imagined I might make nifty audio equipment one day. (No such luck. The computer industry, being a zillion times larger, is what hired me – yeah go figure.)

    By the early to mid eighties, the typical usage of stereo equipment in the frat was:
    - vinyl is only spun on good turntables
    - and only to record cassettes, which are used for everyday playing.

    Vinyl was held in reserve for parties and whatnot, but mostly people made mixtapes with each other's records.

    This was all of course pre-digital. I remember when one of the local bands got a digital delay line that held one whole second of one channel – you could make some wicked effects with that puppy. Hellah expensive. A few lines of code in a Window's mixer program now.

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  3. My apostrophe discipline just goes to shit late at night. Sorry.

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  4. I have been thinking that this technology could be used to remove an instrument from a recording -- not to have the recording without the instrument, but to isolate that instrument so someone can learn to play that part without being distracted by other instruments.

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    1. This is what has fascinated me about this post! Do you know if someone has already designed this? Does Karaoke do this to isolate just the music? Or is this a different technology?

      Thank you for this post Matt! Your research is appreciated!

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    2. Here's what little I know:
      1) Removing an instrument is a little like trying to turn a ham and cheese omelette back into pigs, milk and eggs
      2) See here: http://www.songsurgeon.com/page/Karaoke_Tracks.html

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    3. I do not suggest that as a way to improved the recording, but rather to allow someone to analyze what that instrument is doing so it would be easier to learn how to play that part.

      I am easily lost trying to pick out a part when it is in the mix, but I do understand your comment.

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    4. Matt – a tool like songsurgeon might give you what you need – a "good enough" job, where you can hear your target instrument "well enough" to sound it out, or suppress it well enough to hear your own instrument playing over it.

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    5. Uh-oh. You did it now, Lewy.

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