My impression is that for remotes RCA  used phone lines to a local radio
station and from there looped back to one of their recording studios in
Camden, New York, Hollywood or Chicago. There they would record to wax on a
pair of Scully/Western Electric recording lathes along with possibly an
additional acetate disk for immediate auditioning. The phone line feeds may
also have been sent to a broadcast transcription service where they were
recorded on 16" 33 1/3 as a backup.

A "line equalizer" was used to flatten out the phone line response. That
8.5k low pass that was standard after the recording console before 1940
probably didn't help! It was down 22 dB. at 10 kHz. Just to be fair to the
low end, everything on Victor also got an 18 dB/Octave 45 Hz. hi-pass
haircut well into the LP era.

According to Voyle Gilmore the Capitol 78s (and lots more over the years)
were recorded at RCA Victor's Hollywood studio at 1016 North Sycamore Avenue
which was later known as the Radio Recorders Annex. 
	
Bob Olhsson Audio Mastery, Nashville TN
Mastering, Audio for Picture, Mix Evaluation and Quality Control
Over 40 years making people sound better than they ever imagined!
615.562.4346 http://www.bobolhsson.com http://audiomastery.com

-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tom Fine
Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 4:50 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] SV: [ARSCLIST] Turnover and rolloff curves for
correct playback of 78 rpm records!

Agree that Victor studio recordings tend to sound best with Victor's know
"Orthophonic" playback curve. Pre-electric is a different story. US Decca's
and 1940's Capitol 78's also sound best to my ears when played back with the
common-wisdom curves widely published on the internet. Victor's location
recordings are sometimes a different matter, but it may be inherent
limitations of the recording rather than the recording curve and might be
just as easily fixed with EQ post-Orthophonic preamp, I just like to avoid
an external EQ if possible but there are valid reasons and appropriate times
to use it.

I'm not sure how much original Columbia documentation there is on their
common-knowledge curves, but those usually don't sound right to me. Mercury,
Keynote and Majestic generally used the AES curve, although the Fairchild
recorder that was used at Reeves studio had its own curve slightly different
from AES, but AES works fine for playback of the mass-produced disks. For
the laquers, you can make the rolloff more gentle and hear more of the
extended top end of that system.

Does anyone know if there was company documentation of what Victor was using
for on-location classical recordings in the 30's, for instance Minnesota in
the mid-30's and Philadelphia in the same era? Orthophonic doesn't sound
quite right but if could just be the recordings themselves were noisy and
low-level.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bob Olhsson" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, March 07, 2011 5:37 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] SV: [ARSCLIST] Turnover and rolloff curves for
correct playback of 78 rpm records!


> -----Original Message-----
> From Jack Theakston: "... Was real information about studio EQ 
> published at the time?..."
>
> There were internal standards publications and test records that were 
> shared among the Victor studios however many record labels were in the 
> record player business and no doubt tweaked their curves for the 
> benefit of their own products. I'd guess that most used crystal 
> cartridges with no other playback eq. and their recording channels were
probably aligned accordingly.
>
> Around 1940 Victor began using what they called the Orthacoustic curve 
> which was pre-emphasis very similar to what would later become the New 
> Orthophonic/RIAA curve. This method had become SOP at NBC after some 
> experimentation during the mid '30s so the record division finally 
> adopted it. At the same time they dropped the mandatory use of an 8.5 
> kHz. low pass filter that was much like the Academy Curve used in motion
pictures.
>
> Bob Olhsson Audio Mastery, Nashville TN Mastering, Audio for Picture, 
> Mix Evaluation and Quality Control Over 40 years making people sound 
> better than they ever imagined!
> 615.562.4346 http://www.bobolhsson.com http://audiomastery.com
>