Category: Radio

Audio’s magnetic personality

Magnetic recording tape. Perfected by the Nazis, it is one of the most important innovations in the history of audio, along with Edwin Armstrong’s invention of frequency modulation. These two technologies changed everything.

Magnetic recording in studios, and vinyl microgroove records for homes, first appeared at about the same time — 1947-1948. The transistor was also created in 1947, but it wouldn’t be established in high fidelity audio for another 20 years.

The first tape recorders were brought to America from Germany after World War II by a man named Jack Mullin, who modified one of the units and demonstrated it for Bing Crosby’s technical producer. The tale is told at the end of this link, with the fascinating story of the development of videotape.

Jack Mullin, Frank Healey, Wayne Johnson, Bing Crosby

On October 1, 1947, two takes of Philco Radio Time with Bing Crosby were recorded magnetically by Mullin, and edited into a single, seamless show. The audio player has a minute of that historic program, preceded by a minute of how Bing sounded on January 29 of that year, using disc recording technology. You may recognize the name of Bing’s guitar player, whose son had a successful career as a record producer and musician, and be sure to catch the name of Bing’s arranger-conductor, who would later have a connection to the Peanuts TV specials.

With Crosby’s financial backing, Ampex began manufacturing tape recorders. One of the first production units was given to Les Paul, who had played guitar for Bing. It’s impossible to overstate the influence of what Les Paul did with his tape recorders.

Here are a couple of captivating videos of Les with Mary Ford, performing two of their best known numbers, taken from films of TV shows. Ironically, Ampex wouldn’t perfect magnetic videotape recording until Les and Mary were off of TV. In the second clip, Les kids around before getting to the real demonstration of how he and Mary did what they did so beautifully. These are worth watching twice — first, for Les, and then for Mary. I eat up this stuff like ice cream.

These clips are being streamed from Oobleckboy on YouTube. The comments are his.

Welcome to Pair-o-dice

The push to allow casino gambling is a hot topic here in Massachusetts. Gambling is economically regressive. Much of the money comes from those who can least afford to spend it — day laborers, people on Social Security, etc. The only valid argument that I see favoring Massachusetts casinos is keeping the state’s gamblers from spending their money at Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. WGBH radio in Boston, which recently retooled to compete with FM news leader WBUR, has been doing a series on casino gambling.

http://www.wgbh.org/news/lastresort.cfm

I was surprised to hear that Mohegan Sun wants to develop a casino in Massachusetts.Their chosen site is Palmer, which is one of the many failed mill towns in the region. Apparently Mohegan Sun executives feel Palmer is far enough away from Uncasville, Connecticut that they won’t be competing with themselves.

The decline of communities like Palmer has been going on for a very long time. Over 30 years ago, I spent a day with Nixon-Watergate attorney John Dean, who was speaking at my college, and while we were driving through Western Massachusetts we talked about how many of the once-thriving textile mill towns were in trouble. Is casino gambling a way out of financial desperation? I don’t think so. I think it causes more desperation than it prevents, but if it happens my feeling is very simple: NIMBY.

WGBH: The Jazz Decades, 1972-2010

A Sunday night ritual I’ve had for many years is listening to “The Jazz Decades,” hosted by Ray Smith, on WGBH radio Boston.

http://www.wgbh.org/897/programDetail.cfm?programid=282

Tonight, it was announced that Smith, 87, passed away on Friday. Considering his age, I can’t say this is a surprise, but it is sad news, and a loss for radio and music. The realization that I am now five years older than Smith was when he started at WGBH, and that I first listened to him while still in my 20’s, certainly gives me something to think about.

Some of the names of the Jazz greats from the 20’s and 30’s that Smith often featured, like Teagarden and Beiderbecke, I first learned from a set of cards by Robert Crumb. Hover over the picture to read the back of the card.

At this moment, Smith is playing a recording by the legendary Belgian guitarist Django Reindhardt, with the equally incomparable Stéphane Grappelli on violin. For moi, it doesn’t get any better dan dat.

One of the Internet stations on my list of favorites on my Logitech Squeezebox Radio is WGBH’s 24-hour stream of “The Jazz Decades.” So although Smith is gone, with nearly 2,000 programs in the library, he shall remain.

A Freed man

BBC Radio 2 has a Listen Again (podcast) documentary about pioneering Rock and Roll DJ Alan Freed. I was going to listen to just a few minutes and finish it later, but instead sat through the whole show in one sitting. I think it should be available until next week.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00pqb52/The_Inventor_of_Rock_and_Roll_The_Alan_Freed_Story/

Logitech rules — or at least controls

Oh, the fun and frustration of technology in the home. We now have thirteen(!) devices in the house that depend upon, or use, the Internet.

I’ve come across another quirk with playback from Logitech’s Squeezebox music server. The good news is that Logitech has a PC client called SqueezePlay. The bad new is it’s beta code, and it shows. Squeezeplay lets you choose which Wi-Fi radio in your home network you want to control. The player called Neptune is the Chumby One in the kitchen.

The interface is a slightly modified Squeezebox Radio screen, which is very nice…

… but if it plays on the PC — and that’s a big if — it sometimes sounds almost like Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music!

[audio:http://www.dograt.com/Audio/2010/JAN/Squeezeplay.mp3]

When you don’t hear anything, that probably means control has reverted to the Squeezebox Radio. I assume Logitech can fix this, and I’d be delighted if they would help Chumby develop a Squeezebox UI, because their products really don’t compete directly with one another.

The Logitechal Song

As Wally Cleaver would say, I’ve been goofing around. The Logitech Squeezebox Radio is so good I was inspired to make a video to show how I have it set up. There’s no remote yet, so you get to see my hairy arm working the controls.

[flv:http://www.dograt.com/Video/2009/DEC/Logitech.flv 512 384]

As I said in the video, turn it up and it gets loud. How loud? The meter shows 108 dB, and the sound is clear and solid.

Logitech Squeezebox Radio 108 dB

Something else I mentioned is the music server that’s in the basement. Logitech’s Squeezebox server is running on my spare computer, bought on the day Windows XP was released — October 25, 2001. The music is on a 160 GB USB drive that I outgrew on my primary Windows desktop.

Logitech Squeezebox Server

CD ripping is done with Windows Media Player 11. It’s set up for Carol’s convenience, so that all she has to do is open the tray and insert the disc. It rips and ejects automatically.