ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 ธ.ค. 2024
- "A PARADOX OF TECHNICAL PROGRESS [OR, LET'S HEAR IT FOR ABSTRACT ART ... or, why else did Kazimir Malevich call his work 'a new realism'?] / The primary aim of modern sound recording techniques is to convey a naturalistic impression of whatever is making the music - let's say, for example, an orchestra. With the old recording methods (i.e., from the 78 rpm days) everything turned out to be the opposite in spite of efforts to achieve "naturalism" in sound. With present recording techniques, a "natural" sound has provisionally been achieved - while the musical sense has become ever more remote and elusive. In the case of pre-modern recordings, the sound of an orchestra remains, at best, an ABSTRACTION - while the musical sense conveyed is so 'real' that one can almost touch it. [...]
"The influence of naturalism
Roland Gelatt [in 'The Fabulous Phonograph'] has pointed out that the idea of a sound recording being a faithful representation of the original is a chimera running through a hundred years of history. It is true that many recording engineers (including those of Edison) conducted tests seeking to prove this point to sceptical consumers, and that they were often successful. It is also true that no-one with the ability to monitor sound in the manner of section 13.5 above has been able to resist running to the room with the performers and seeing what it sounds like there. But it must be confessed that the results of these experiments haven’t been very significant.
The fact is that sound recording is an art form, not a craft. Its significance as a faithful preserver of sound is usually no greater than that of the film 'King Kong' documenting the architecture of New York. Whilst sound archivists clearly have a responsibility to 'preserve the original sound' where it exists, their responsibilities to 'preserve the original INTENDED sound' are much greater. Let us close this chapter, and this manual, with our thanks and respects to the engineers who elevated sound recording from a craft to an art."
From the Conclusion to "Manual of Analogue Sound Restoration Techniques" by Peter Copeland (2008) usermanual.wik...
(… so, when "abstract" = "more real" is really the case, maybe this is something worth looking into a bit closer... )
Peter Tchaikovsky (1840-1893)
Symphony No. 2 in C minor, Op. 17 "Little Russian"
I. Andante sostenuto; Allegro vivo
II. Andantino marziale, quasi moderato
III. Scherzo: Allegro molto vivace
IV. Finale: Allegro vivace
Cincinati Symphony Orchestra / Sir Eugene Goossens
(Victor, recorded 1942)
78 rpm transfers.
I first heard this set from a library copy c. 1963. It was the only recording of this work around at the time … (and for this listener, it STILL is).
The critic Irving Kolodin got it correct enough in his review of this recording when it first appeared:
"It is good to have so capable an orchestra as the Cincinatti on discs, but it is even better to have the aware musicianship and warm sympathies Goossens [who was ALSO a composer] employed to this lively, well-constructed score .… The recording is excellent."
("New Guide to Recorded Music", First Revised Edition, Doubleday, 1947)
