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Botched experimental stereo - fully restored and remastered
Review of this release: Audiophile Audition
Why the inverted commas? Well, when you hear the sound they produced it is most certainly coming out of two speakers, but it's not a particularly pleasant listen, and fails to capture any of the sense of perspective or width that one would expect to find in a stereo orchestral recording. It sounds like the microphone positioning is exceptionally close, and there's nothing of the acoustic of Carnegie Hall to be heard at all. At times the soundstage is overly wide and disconnected, the sound itself hard and harsh - an uncomfortable listen. This was greatly ameliorated by the re-equalisation part of the XR processing, but still the sound was flat and "in your face". In continuing this restoration, therefore, I soon realised that what it would need might go beyond the bounds of my previous work. I acquired new software for stereo ambience processing, allowing me to extract any hall reverberation present in the recording and enhance it, effectively pushing the orchestra "back" with respect to the ambient sound around it, but this remarkable software does not generate reverberation, working only with what it can extract from the recording itself. Here there was just about nothing to be had, and with some reluctance I applied a judicious amount of digital reverberation - just enough to give some space around the instruments. I then returned to the stereo ambience processor, and was able to find a much better spacial balance between the orchestra and its space, narrowing the stereo field slightly for the direct sound, whilst retaining a broader soundstage for the reverberation, and effectively moving the orchestra back a few steps - whilst retaining the clarity and punch of Toscanini's sound. I believe this recording may now come closer than almost any other in capturing the kind of sound one might have heard at a Toscanini concert in Carnegie Hall (though I'm sure if you were seated at the back of the hall it would be far more reverberant that this!). It is a great pity that so many of his finest performances have been available in poor quality sound, but here, at the very end of his exceptionally long conducting career, we may finally hear more clearly than before the true sound of the maestro at work.
NB. A section of nearly 2 minutes at the end of the third movement of Tchaikovsky's 6th Symphony has been dubbed into this recording from an inferior secondary source following the loss of this from the original master tapes. I have endeavoured to match as well as possible the sound quality of this to that of the rest of the recording, but there is some loss of clarity and some higher background noise levels to be heard here.
Notes on the 24-bit download: Please see this page for test files and further information regarding this format. Although restoration work is done at a sample rate of 44.1kHz, we have upsampled the final 24-bit master to 48kHz for additional replay compatibility of our FLAC download. Our twenty-four bit FLAC downloads can be replayed in full quality using a standard DVD video player, a DVD writer and an inexpensive piece of PC software - see here for more information about replay from Video DVD discs.
The development of two-channel Stereo sound recording notes from Wikipedia
Clément Ader demonstrated the first two-channel audio system in Paris in 1881, with a series of telephone transmitters connected from the stage of the Paris Opera to a suite of rooms at the Paris Electrical Exhibition, where listeners could hear a live transmission of performances through receivers for each ear. Scientific American reported: Every one who has been fortunate enough to hear the telephones at the Palais de l'Industrie has remarked that, in listening with both ears at the two telephones, the sound takes a special character of relief and localization which a single receiver cannot produce. . . . This phenomenon is very curious, it approximates to the theory of binauriclar auduition, and has never been applied, we believe, before to produce this remarkable illusion to which may almost be given the name of auditive perspective. This two-channel telephonic process was commercialized in France from 1890 to 1932 as the Théâtrophone, and in England from 1895 to 1925 as the Electrophone. Both were services available by coin-operated receivers at hotels and cafés, or by subscription to private homes. In the 1930s, Harvey Fletcher of Bell Laboratories investigated techniques for stereophonic recording and reproduction. One of the techniques investigated was the 'Wall of Sound,' which used an enormous array of microphones hung in a line across the front of an orchestra. Up to eighty microphones were used, and each fed a corresponding loudspeaker, placed in an identical position, in a separate listening room. Several stereophonic test recordings, using two microphones connected to two styli cutting two separate grooves on the same wax disc, were made with Leopold Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra at Philadelphia's Academy of Music in March 1932. The first, made on March 12, 1932 of Scriabin's Prometheus: Poem of Fire, is the earliest surviving stereo recording. Bell Laboratories gave a demonstration of three-channel stereophonic sound on April 27, 1933 with a live transmission of the Philadelphia Orchestra from Philadelphia to Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C. Leopold Stokowski, normally the orchestra's conductor, was present in Constitution Hall to control the sound mix. Bell Labs also demonstrated binaural sound, using a dummy with microphones instead of ears, at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933. Two stereophonic recording methods, using two channels and coincident microphone techniques (X-Y with bidirectional transducers / Blumlein-setup & M/S-stereophony), were developed by Alan Blumlein at EMI in 1931 and patented in 1933. A stereo disc, using the two walls of the groove at right angles to carry the two channels, was cut at EMI in 1933, twenty-five years before that method became the standard for stereo phonograph discs. The Carnegie Hall demonstration by Bell Laboratories on April 9 and 10, 1940, used three huge speaker systems. Synchronization was achieved by making the recordings in the form of three motion-picture soundtracks recorded on a single piece of film. Because of dynamic range limitations, volume compression was used, with a fourth track being used to regulate volume expansion. The Dolby noise reduction system of the 1970s was a far more sophisticated version of a basically similar technique. The volume compression and expansion were not fully automatic, but were designed to allow manual studio "enhancement", i.e., the artistic adjustment of overall volume and the relative volume of each track. The recordings had been made by the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Leopold Stokowski, who was always interested in sound reproduction technology. Stokowski personally participated in the "enhancement" of the sound. The speakers used generated 1,500 watts of acoustic power, producing sound levels of up to 100 decibels, and the demonstration held the audience "spellbound, and at times not a little terrified," according to one report. Sergei Rachmaninoff, who was present at the demonstration, commented that it was "marvellous" but "somehow unmusical because of the loudness." "Take that Pictures at an Exhibition," he said. "I didn't know what it was until they got well into the piece. Too much 'enhancing', too much Stokowski. From 1940 to 1970, the progress of stereophonic sound was paced by the technical difficulties of recording and reproducing two (or more) channels in synchronization, and by the economic and marketing issues of introducing new audio media and equipment. To a rough approximation, a stereo system cost twice as much as a monophonic system, since a stereo system had to be assembled by buying two preamplifiers, two amplifiers, and two speaker system. It was not clear whether consumers would think the sound was so much better as to be worth twice the price. In 1952 Emory Cook (1913–2002), who already made fame by designing new feedback disk cutter heads to improve sound from tape to vinyl, developed a 'binaural' record. This record consisted of two separate channels cut into two separate grooves running next to each other. Each groove needed a needle and each needle was connected to a separate amplifier and speaker. The set-up was intended to give a demonstration at a New York audio fair of Cook's cutter heads rather than to sell the record. But soon afterwards the demand for such recordings and the equipment to play it grew, and Cook Records began to produce such records commercially. He recorded a vast array of sounds, ranging from railroad sounds to thunderstorms. (The term 'binaural' that Cook used should not be confused with the modern use of the word, where 'binaural' is an inner ear recording using small microphones placed in the ear. Cook used conventional microphones but gave his stereo record the name 'binaural' record.) In 1953, Remington Records began taping some of its sessions in stereo, including performances by Thor Johnson and the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. Later that year, RCA Victor conducted some experimental stereo tapings with Leopold Stokowski and a group of New York musicians; in February 1954, RCA taped the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Charles Münch in a performance of Berlioz's Damnation of Faust, which led to regular stereo tapings by the company. Shortly afterwards, legendary conductor Arturo Toscanini's last two public concerts were recorded on stereophonic magnetic tape. In the UK, Decca Records began taping in stereo in mid-1954. In the early 1950s, companies such as Concertapes and RCA Victor began releasing stereophonic recordings on two-track prerecorded reel-to-reel magnetic tape. Serious audiophiles, the sort of people who would later be called "early adopters", bought them, and stereophonic sound came to at least some living rooms. Stereo recording became widespread in the music business by the fall of 1957... From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereophonic_sound
Tchaikovsky: Symphony No. 6 "Pathétique" in B minor, Op. 74 musical notes from Wikipedia
The Symphony No. 6 in B minor, Pathétique, Op. 74 is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's final symphony, written between February and the end of August 1893. The composer led the first performance in St. Petersburg on October 28 of that year, nine days before his death. The second performance, under Eduard Nápravník, took place 20 days later at a memorial concert.
Title The Russian title of the symphony, Патетическая (Patetičeskaja), means "passionate" or "emotional", not "arousing pity". Tchaikovsky considered calling it Программная (Programmnaja or "Programme Symphony") but realised that would encourage curiosity about the programme, which he did not want to reveal. According to his brother Modest, he suggested the Патетическая title, which was used in early editions of the symphony; there are conflicting accounts about whether Tchaikovsky liked the title, but in any event his publisher chose to keep it and the title remained. Its French translation Pathétique is generally used in French, English, German and other languages.
Instrumentation The symphony is scored for 3 flutes (3rd doubling piccolo), 2 oboes, 2 clarinets in A, 2 bassoons, 4 horns in F, 2 trumpets in B-flat and A, 3 trombones (2 tenors and 1 bass), tuba, 3 timpani, bass drum, cymbals, tam-tam (ad libitum) and strings. A bass clarinet is sometimes used to play the bassoon solo marked pppppp in the first movement, to get the desired quietness.
Structure The symphony contains four movements
Cello Concerto Among the sketches for the "Pathétique" were found sketches of a projected Cello Concerto. It was debated whether or not the sketches were to belong to the finale of the symphony or a completely different work. After much discussion, experts agreed that the sketches belonged to the Cello Concerto.
Notes from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symphony_No._6_(Tchaikovsky)
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