The talking machine world (Jan-June 1927)

12 THE TALKING MACHINE WORLD February 15, 1927 Simplified Science in the Salesmen's Selling Talk What Do You Say to the Customer Who Wants to Know the Difference Between the Old and New Talking Machine Products on Your Floors The present tendency among manufacturers of talking machines is to take the public into their confidence through national advertising, telling them frankly the difference between the old and the new in recording and reproduction. Probably nothing more clearly than this could show the extraordinary change that has taken place in the public attitude towards science in general. Twenty years ago it would have been absurd, from an advertising standpoint, to write advanced physics into any kind of copy, no matter in how diluted a form. To-day it is not only possible but desirable to do this. Science and the Public Now, merchants who watch carefully the shifting tides of public opinion and feeling will usually find that the advertising experts employed by the great manufacturers are the best of beacon lights. When, therefore, we find them actually talking the physics of modern phonograph recording and reproduction, we feel fairly safe in taking their example home to ourselves and applying it to our own requirements. In other words, the wise merchant will, by this time, have perceived that the great buying public has almost universally acquired some smattering of knowledge concerning the propagation and transmission of sound. The public of to-day is quite ready to have the phonograph sold to it, but the process of selling will have to be pretty complete and quite well thought out. To tell the story well is to make sales easily; to tell it poorly is to miss them. What have we then to say to the inquirer who comes to find out something about one of the new makes of talking machine or some of the new electrical recordings? Plainly we may be quite as open and frank as our knowledge will allow us to be. An Imaginary Conversation "The new era in the phonograph world," one can imagine a salesman saying, "began when to the phonograph records were applied the new principles of sound transmission which had been gradually worked out by the telephone investigators in their laboratories during many years. These principles only became practically applicable a very short time ago and as soon as they could be applied to the special case of the phonographic record they were so applied. What has since happened simply shows that there is absolutely no limit to the possibilities of recording or of reproduction. There is no doubt that the day is rapidly approaching when within a few days of a great performance of opera, of oratorio, of symphony, of the proceedings of a great political convention or of the speech of a great orator, records will be on sale which were made during the actual event, and which will reproduce every slightest detail with perfect fidelity and with all the volume of the original, as heard from a favorable place in the audience. Such records, forming a permanent library of imperishable performances, caught at the instant of inspiration and instinct with a sense of space and of reality, will be in evervone"s home at the lowest cost. In selling the new type talking machines and records to owners of old type instruments, the dealer must be able to give a logical and convincing explanation of the superiority of the new over the old. Incorporate the explanation of the new methods of recording into your sales talks. "Even at this very moment the records on sale here and now give us almost all these wonders. "And how is it done? That would be too long a story to tell in scientific detail; nor would this interest you. But this much may be said: the old system involved catching the sound waves of performed music or of other sounds in a horn and impressing them thence upon a glass diaphragm sufficiently sensitive to respond to the very tiny amount of energy carried on the air. To get near enough to the horn was always the difficulty, especially when more than one voice or instrument was used, and became an impossibility with a large body of instruments. Under the old arrangements in fact, only comparatively small bodies of singers or instrumentalists could be used in the recording room, and no ingenuity of seating could assure equal treatment to each type and style of instrument or voice. Simplified Science "Now, all is changed. The orchestra may gather in any suitable place, in the concert hall itself if required, and may be seated in its accustomed order, with conductor, strings, wood-wind, brass, drums, with soloist if there is any, in fact with everything as it would be for an ordinary performance. In fact, if necessary, as was said before, the recording may be done during an ordinary concert. But, however that may be, the point is that to-day one merely sets up a slender post on wheels which carries what looks rather like a somewhat exaggerated telephone receiver. This is the microphone. When it is placed in front of the body of musicians it receives every sound that floats toward it on the air, with a sensitive power far surpassing even that of the human ear. The tiny sound vibrations impinge upon a diaphragm which, as it moves, makes and breaks a sensitive electric current. The air vibrations are turned into electric vibrations. Thence the electric energy may be stepped up to any required amplitude, so that when at last the revolving wax disc is reached which is to embalm them imperishably, and from which your record is to be struck off, the tiniest and most delicate weak sound is impressed in the soft material to a depth that shall assure its returning to your ear whenever you wish, in all its original power, and if needed, even in more than that power. "The details are intensely interesting, of course, but they are not matter for inaccurate comment. One system uses the action of a vibrating ray of light, set in motion by the sounds, upon a selenium cell, whereby electrical currents are made and broken. Others work directly, by a refinement of the telephonic method. In all cases, however, electric energy is obtained from the original sounds and it is this electric energy, standing between music and disc, which accounts for the wonders of present-day recordings The Machines "The new machines, of course, have been designed primarily to care for the enormously greater power and range of the new recordings. They are mainly a development and refinement of the older types, having larger tone chambers, built often on the principle of reflecting sound back and forth in order to obtain sufficient length to develop properly the long waves of the low bass tones. One well-known type uses radio receiving principles and works through vacuum tubes, having immense possibilities of volume and power. "In a word, the talking machine and the record of to-day are in no way to be compared with their predecessors. They are not only new but utterly novel and revolutionary. \\ hat they do has never been done before and they have no rival in their field. "Whatever you may think of the modern phonograph, you must never think of it in terms of the old one. The latter had its great and wonderful place to fill, and filled it nobly. It still brings comfort, entertainment and cheer to hundreds of thousands. But it is superseded, and jn its place is something so much more wonderful that comparisons are out of the question." All of which may constitute a poor sales talk; but so far as it goes, it appeals to its author as being better than some he has heard. I STARR PIANOS STARR PHONOGRAPHS GENNETT RECORDS 'Represent the Hiqhest oAttainment in cMusical OVorth We STARR PIANO COMPANY Established 1872 Richmond. Indiana