Phonograph Monthly Review, Vol. 6, No. 1 (1931-10)

4 Engineers of the Brunswick, Columbia, and Victor companies have been working frantically during the last year on the per- fection of these plans. Now Victor comes forward with the actual fruition of its work. Mr. Axel B. Johnson tells me that in recent interviews with Messrs. E. F. Stevens, Jr. and Lanyon of the Brunswick Corporation, and Mr. George C. Jell of the Columbia Phonograph Company, he learned that their companies’ experimental work was also near- ly completed and that definite announcements may be expected in the very near future. That the RCA-Victor Company was on the eve of commercial introduction of the new discs was apparent several months ago when word got around that the Philadelphia Sym- phony had hurriedly been re-assembled and under Dr. Stokowski’s baton had made a new recording of Beethoven’s C minor Sym- phony. Now a new version of the Fifth is scarcely phonographic news; but the fact that this fifth was recorded on one double- sided record most certainly is news. The recording was made frankly as an ex- periment, but its success stimulated the has- ty fruition of long laid plans and on Septem- ber 17th the new records and instruments were first demonstrated to an invitation audience at the Savoy-Plaza Hotel. Now come the public announcements, and the in- struments will be on sale around the tenth of October; the records themselves around the 30th. Fittingly they are named “program transcriptions” in contradistinction to or- dinary records which reproduce only ex- cerpts or portions of a composition. The announcement at the Savoy-Plaza came as the climax of an evolutionary review of the “musical milestones” in the develop- ment of the phonograph, beginning with the earliest crude cylinder models and going up to the best of present day instruments. A movement of Beethoven’s fifth symphony was begun, and came to an abrupt stop as the record side ended. But now—the new instru- ment was started and the complete symphony played through on a single disc. The new discs are recorded at 33 /3 revolu- tions per minute and contain nearly twice the number of grooves on the playing surface as the old discs. They are made of a new composition trade-named “Vitrolac,” which like the recent Durium is semi-flexible and practically unbreakable. The new material permits the use of more grooves to the inch and reduces still further that ancient bete- noir, surface noise. The slower turntable speed is obtained by a new gear clutch ar- rangement which permits instantaneous The Phonograph Monthly Review shifting between the old and new speeds. Two new types of needles have been introduced with the new discs: both are chromium plated and are differently colored for identification. One type plays approximately twenty-five of the new long-playing discs with out replace- ment; the other plays around one hundred ordinary records without replacement. The two types are not interchangeable. A list of some thirty-three long-playing discs has been announced of which (appar- ently) the Beethoven fifth symphony is the only work as yet specially recorded directly for the new discs. The others include recent and best-selling works re-recorded from its original old style discs. Herein lies one of the supreme advantages of the new system: it enables the wealth of music already re- corded to be easily converted from old to new discs. New works will be added as rapidly as possible: original recordings (among them the complete musical score of the current Broadway success, The Band Wagon) and re-recordings from the best of the present catalogue. The prices of the new discs offer a sub- stantial saving over the equivalent number of old records, in addition to the new features of convenience and unbroken continuity. The following works are listed as twelve- inch discs, $4.50 each. Except where noted the works are complete on a single disc. Beethoven: Symphony in C minor, played by the Philadelphians under Stokowski; Tchai- kowsky’s “Nutcracker” suite by the Philadel- phians ; Rimsky’s Grande i Paque Russe over- ture and Tchaikowski’s Capriccio Italien (Philadelphia Orchestra); Chopin’s Sonata in B flat minor played by Rachmaninoff; Hay- dn’s Symphony No. 4 in D major (Toscanini and the New York Philharmonic-Sym- phony) ; the final scene from Aida (Ponselle and Martinelli) and the Death Scene from La Boheme (Bori and Schipa). Twelve-inch, $3.00 each. Beethoven’s fourth Symphony (Casals and his Barcelona Orchestra) ; Grieg’s Peer Gynt suites Nos. 1 and 2 (Bourdon and the 'Victor Symphony Orchestra respectively); Gilbert and Sulli- van’s H. M. S. Pinafore complete—3 discs (D’Oyly Carte Company) Mascagni’s Cav- alleria Rusticana complete—3 discs (La Scala Company). Ten-inch, $3.00 each. Strawinski’s Pe- tr ouchka suite (Koussevitsky and the Boston Symphony Orchestra); Bizet’s Carmen Suite (Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra); Farewell and Death of Boris, and the finale of Don Quichotte (Chaliapin); the second Liszt Hungarian Rhapsody and Weber’ In-