Gramophone Notes

John Gray

Long-playing records have been an established fact for three years, and first supplies for New Zealand are officially on order. The time has come for a definite assessment of this biggest advance in the gramophone world since the advent of electrical recording a quarter of a century ago.

First, as to practical details. The records are made in the ‘normal’ sizes of 10-inch and 12-inch, and play on a turntable revolving at 33 1–3 revolutions a minute instead of the standard 78. (It is convenient to ignore the 45 r.p.m. disc introduced by one or two companies in America — this disc is not so much page 125 long playing as quick changing, and its reproduction requires a radically different set.) The standard 33 1–3 10-inch disc will play for 12 or 13 minutes on each side. The standard 12-inch will play for an average of 25 minutes each side. (I have encountered some which play nearly all of 30 minutes.) This length of playing time is achieved by the slow speed in conjunction with the extreme fineness of the grooves. These factors demand the use of an extra light weight pickup fitted with an appropriately small needle.

It is obvious that all this is of great benefit to the serious music lover. A work such as Scheherazade, previously obtainable on six or at least five cumbersome shellac discs. can now be obtained complete on one thin, plastic, and virtually unbreakable 12-inch record. Two movements go comfortably on to each side of the disc and the only ‘break’ is a perfectly natural one. Shorter works can be heard with no interruption whatever. One side of a 12-inch LP record will hold Strauss's Don Juan, Liszt's E flat piano concerto or the Brahms Variations on a theme by Haydn (even, in one case I could mention, the whole of the Grieg Concerto). One side of a 10-inch disc will suffice for the Academic Festival overture or Smetanas' Moldau. And, to make life complete, a New Zealand firm has already imported a playing desk with a two-speed motor and interchangeable pickup heads, so that it requires a moment's work and the flick of a lever to change from 78 to 33 1–3 or vice versa, and thus one can play either kind of record with equal ease.

So far so good. Now for a few less pleasant but equally definite facts. The first is that the discs themselves, though nominally unbreakable, are far more susceptible to surface damage than the shellac discs which most of us treat very carefully. They attract dust as a flame does a moth and they just cannot be roughly handled in any way. If they are in the slightest degree warped or buckled the result will play havoc with the pitch, and a small scratch on the surface which would go unnoticed on a standard disc may give cause to an annoying ‘tick’ of a minute's duration. Then the musical side is apt to be unsatisfactory — some works suit LP better than others. The companies have set their hearts on 10-inch and 12-inch sizes, which works out well in most cases but not all. In more than one case they have put a Haydn Symphony on to a 10-inch record, with the result that the turnover in the middle comes halfway through the slow movement! No one in his senses will welcome LP if it brings with it the worst features of the present recording system. Then, in order to obtain a short work on one side of a disc, you may be compelled to buy, on the other side, a work that you don't particularly want. Worst of all, their enthusiasm for LP has lead the companies into issuing ‘recital’ records, on which a singer or pianist ploughs through anything up to a dozen (generally ill-assorted) numbers. One assumes these discs would be given a wide berth by the more serious collectors, but as they are appearing in increasing numbers it must be presumed there is a demand for them.

Another factor is that of reproduction. You page 126 just can't hitch up an LP turntable to your ordinary radio and expect to get all there is to get out of the new records — these discs, especially English Decca, are of a greatly extended range and nothing will do except a properly constructed amplifier and speaker. I am no technician and cannot elaborate this side of the matter, though it is obviously one to consider carefully. It is for every collector to decide whether he is getting enough of the music reproduced to satisfy his own taste.

The most amazing and heartening aspect of the whole LP revolution has been the increased repertoire which has appeared on records. That most of these records are released only in America (though largely recorded in Europe) and would be most difficult to obtain here cannot lessen our wonder and admiration. Who would have thought five years ago that by today there would be no fewer than 50 of Haydn's 104 symphonies obtainable on records? That almost half a dozen of this composer's Masses would be recorded? That the repertoire of complete or substantially complete operas would by now include Idomeneo, Il Seraglio, Fidelio, The Flying Dutchman, Ernani, L'amore di tre re, Fledermaus, Puccini's three one-act operas and his Girl of the Golden West? That recorded choral works would include Bach's St John Passion, Mozart's Coronation Mass, an early Beethoven mass and Haydn's Creation? Other achievements of LP include recordings of practically the whole of the Bach Festival given under the direction of Casals in the town of Prades last year, Strauss's Electra recorded complete at the Florence Festival, and a complete Die Meistersinger done in Vienna.

In this article it has not been possible to do more than touch the surface of a fascinating subject. LP is here to stay and the newest records are markedly better than the earlier ones, but the serious record collector will welcome it as an additional feature rather than a replacement of the old system. Those of us who have been collecting for some years are not going to discard our pre-war Busch and Budapest quartet recordings, our Glynde-bourne Mozart operas or our Mozart symphonies conducted by Beecham. If we wish to march with the times we must have apparatus that can give us the best of both worlds, and even here there may be some loss, for I am afraid that these new playing desks make us rather painfully aware of the technical limitations of some of the older records. But I cannot see that the enormous amount of music now being recorded would ever have been possible without the advent of LP, and for that reason at least we should treat the newcomer with respect.

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