1) Don't forget that John RT Davies had one of the greatest collections of
jazz 78s in the world, and most of them were in E+ to M condition!  (I was 
once told that John never transferred metal parts and that he was horrified
by the idea!  I wanted to discuss this with him, but he died before I could 
do so.)

2) When making a transfer John used his graphic equalizer (Klark-Teknik),
to filter out completely all the noise above the music.  Of critical importance
was that John was a musician and had "good ears".

3) John also used his equalizer to make corrections to the frequency spectrum
of the music, but he did so with "a musician's ear", with respect for the original 
recording characteristic, and with the objective of making the music sound as 
natural as possible. (My words, not his.)

4) John is the one who devised the technique of scraping oxide off the tape to 
remove (attenuate) pops and clicks.  This he did with consummate skill, unlike
some others who tried it ;-)

5) John was not afraid to use processors to help remove surface noises.
He used a device called The Front End, designed and built by British engineer
Ted Kendell (who worked with John).  John referred to the device, humorously,
as "the mousetrap".  Later I believe I was the one who persuaded John to try
CEDAR's Declicker, which I believe he did use from that point on.

 6) Speaking of splicing tape to remove pops and clicks: I worked on many
LP reissues at Columbia in the mid 1970's and the razor blade was the number 
one tool.  Larry Keyes, who worked on the Bessie Smith reissues, made 15 ips
quarter-track tapes for de-clicking on the theory that de-clicking a recorded
track of such small width shortens the program less than removing the same click 
from a full-track recording - I'm not sure who actually came up with that idea.

My own discovery was that, using a full-track recording, you don't need to 
cut out the entire click, which removes about 1/4" of tape, but you could
just cut out the middle of the click (say 1/8" inch) and this leaves a tiny bit
of the click at the top of the tape on the incoming side, and a tiny bit on the
bottom on the outgoing side but these two smaller clicks, now separated in 
time, simply become inaudible!

The noise removal world has surely changed!  When I bought the CEDAR
Declicker, it cost $15,000.  Today there are declickers which are very nearly
as good, which sell for less than $100.  But the operator remains the most 
critical component.  Even CEDAR's excellent processors can be made to 
sound bad by an insensitive operator.

Doug Pomeroy
Audio Restoration & Mastering Services
[log in to unmask]

> From: "Jon Samuels" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Monday, October 01, 2012 5:15 PM
> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Reducing crackle from 78 rpm records the analogue way on 70's reissue LP's
> 
> 
> Dennis and I are in complete agreement here. The most effective tools in remastering ANYTHING are 
> good ears and good judgment. Sounds much easier than it is, but it's a fact. After that, having a 
> high quality sound source, proper disc preparation and using the proper playback equipment in good 
> working order are key. As Tom wrote, it is far better to have a better sound source than to clean it 
> up after the fact. Think of it as a vaccine, rather than a cure. Far better never to have the 
> disease, than to try and cure it.
> In my experience, ALL de-noising programs or hardware (whether declicking, decracking or removing 
> steady noise) have anywhere from a little to a lot of negative effect on the signal. There is no 
> free lunch. For example, Sonic No Noise has a manual deticking series of algorithms that are very 
> time consuming to use (if removing many ticks), but work quite well. I did a test however, on a 
> extremely ticky 78 side, and removed the ticks manually using these algorithms. I found to my dismay 
> that when I A-B'ed the original to the deticked version, the signal had become somewhat duller, and 
> EQ'ing did not restore the lost "bloom". Having said that, CEDAR Cambridge, Sonic No Noise, iZotope 
> RX2, Weiss DNA-1 etc, can be highly effective in reducing noise, and the negative effects can be 
> either acceptable or compensated for to some degree if the software/hardware are used judiciously.
> Jon Samuels