目次
A single document exists.
Titled LP record Kaneda ADConverter to digital data play Roland R44, it bears the signature of Akihiko Kaneda at the end. Dated October 2017 update, it is a list of records.
This document was distributed at listening sessions for the Kaneda-style DC amplifier, and it lists the records actually played there. 28 classical entries, 20 jazz entries, and 3 CD entries, for a total of 51 discs.
Since these records were used for amplifier evaluation, there is only one selection criterion: sound quality. They were chosen not for performance ratings or composer importance, but for what is heard when played.
We researched when, where, and by whom these 51 discs were recorded, consulting sources worldwide for each one. This is that record.
The 51-disc list
In the order of the original document. You can filter by track title or artist name.
The recording teams converge on four
When the 51 discs are rearranged by recording engineer, a clear bias emerges.
Mercury Living Presence
Engineer: C. Robert Fine. Producer: Wilma Cozart Fine.
From 1955, they used only three omnidirectional microphones, recording left, center, and right directly onto 1/2-inch 3-track tape. The design placed the center microphone as the main element, essentially expanding the single-microphone technique of the mono era into stereo.
The microphone used was the Schoeps M201. In the US, it was also distributed under the name Telefunken 201. It is the same microphone, not a different one. Developed by Schoeps in 1952, at a time when Neumann and AKG also sold their products under the Telefunken name. In its omnidirectional setting, it functions as a pure pressure transducer with a single diaphragm.
In this list, three discs correspond: The Firebird, The Rite of Spring, and Morning Song of the Clown.
Decca (London in Japan)
The three-point suspended array known as the Decca Tree was created in the early 1950s by Roy Wallace, Kenneth Wilkinson, and Arthur Haddy.
It was first used in 1954 at Victoria Hall in Geneva, for a recording of the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande conducted by Ansermet. Initially, they used cardioid Neumann KM56s angled at 30 degrees; from 1955, the omnidirectional Neumann M50, favored by Wilkinson, became standard. Wilkinson later added two more microphones on the sides, making a five-microphone setup.
In this list, London/Decca discs number over 20, accounting for 40% of the total.
Van Gelder
Rudy Van Gelder began recording in the living room of his home in Hackensack, New Jersey, and later built a studio in Englewood Cliffs.
Coltrane's Blue Train was recorded on September 15, 1957, at his Hackensack home. Basie's Impulse album was recorded in March 1962 at Englewood Cliffs. The list includes both periods of his work.
Contemporary
Engineer: Roy DuNann. The recording chain was all-tube. On Lester Koenig's label, DuNann's recordings have long been prized.
Two discs: Art Pepper's Tin Tin Deo and Barney Kessel's Be Deedle Dee Do.
The four rooms Decca used
The 20-odd London/Decca discs converge on four locations.
Three of the four are not buildings originally built for performance. They were rooms chosen for their acoustics and low ambient noise.
Kingsway Hall had an underground railway running beneath it. Recordings were made between train intervals. The Seville recording was made by Kenneth Wilkinson and Alan Reeve, produced by John Mordler, on November 1 and 2, 1967, according to surviving records.
On the jazz side, it was Basie and Ellington
A recount of the jazz section in the original document reveals an unexpected bias.
Count Basie appears on seven discs: MW 2167, YS-7116-RO, KI 7909, YW-7841-RO, A-15, 2310-901, and CL 1715.
Duke Ellington appears on three.
The one entry for Sunny is easy to overlook because the original's artist column simply says "Francis Albert Sinatra." In reality, it is the collaboration album Francis A. & Edward K., recorded on December 11 and 12, 1967, in Hollywood, with arrangements by Billy May.
Out of 20 jazz entries, 11 are by these two artists.
The reason can be explained from both recording and playback perspectives. A big band, with over a dozen wind instruments attacking simultaneously, is the most demanding material for transient response and imaging. For amplifier evaluation, there is little better material.
Battle Royal goes even further. Recorded on July 6, 1961, at Columbia's 30th Street Studio in New York, this disc places the Basie band on the left and the Ellington band on the right in stereo. It is designed to have two big bands playing simultaneously, separated left and right.
Regarding the four entries for KIMBERLY 11011
In the original document, four entries share the same catalog number.
Leap Frog by Les Brown, Song of India by Tommy Dorsey, Anvil Chorus by Glenn Miller, Mambo Jambo by Perez Prado. The performers are all different, yet the record number is KIMBERLY 11011 for each.
Upon investigation, these four tracks are on the same disc: Percussion in a Tribute to the Big Bands, performed by the Frankie Capp Percussion Group.
In other words, the performers listed in the original document are the names of the bands that originally played those tunes, but the people playing on this disc are different.
Kimberly was a label focused on percussion demonstration records, with mono releases in the 2000 series and stereo in the 11000 series.
Since this is a disc designed to showcase percussion attack and imaging, the reason for its selection at the listening sessions is clear.
Incidentally, Frankie Capp, who plays on this disc, also plays drums on the list's RealTime RT-101 For Duke. The same person appears twice, in different contexts.
The going and returning of tube microphones
Something I noticed after finishing the research.
The core of this list is concentrated in the late 1950s to early 1960s. Decca's Neumann M50, Mercury's Schoeps M201, Van Gelder's living room, Contemporary's all-tube chain. It was an era when tube microphones were the norm.
On the other hand, the most recent disc on the list is Pablo 2310-901, Basie's 88 Basie Street. Recorded on May 11 and 12, 1983, at Ocean Way Studios in Hollywood, engineered by Allen Sides.
In the 1980s, studios were moving to new phantom-powered microphones and discarding their tube mics. At that time, Allen Sides traveled around Europe, buying up those discarded mics. Neumann and AKG tube models, RCA ribbons, four Telefunken ELAM 251s. Those collected items remained in his possession.
This list is bookended by discs from the era when tube microphones were standard, and a disc by someone who gathered them up when they were being cast aside.
Kaneda selected purely by ear. It is not a systematically assembled list. Yet this pattern emerged.
A disc-by-disc record
Here are the ones for which we could confirm details, along with recording information.
What remained unknown
I will state plainly what I could not fully research.
I was unable to identify which album the track "Belly Roll" on Verve KI 7909 belongs to. The same goes for "Has Anyone Here Seen Basie" on Roulette YS-7116-RO.
The label name "M&M Enterpriser" written for the Marty Paich entry could not be verified. The number W1349 matches a Warner Bros. release, but the label name does not. It may be an alternate pressing, but I could not confirm it.
For the Vienna Philharmonia Quartet's Death and the Maiden (SLC 1371), Solti and the Israel Philharmonic's Serenade for Strings (SLB 44), and Ansermet's Carmen Prelude (SLC1514), I could not determine the recording dates.
Among the three CDs, I also could not trace the recording details for Abbado's Luisa Miller or Levine's Swan Lake.
These will be added as information becomes available.
About the document
This list is a document distributed at the public listening sessions for the Kaneda-style DC amplifier. It is signed by Akihiko Kaneda and dated October 2017 update.
As the heading LP record Kaneda ADConverter to digital data play Roland R44 indicates, at the sessions the records were not played directly; they were first digitized and then played back. The signal path was: play the record, pass through an AD converter, and play back on a Roland R44.
Selecting good-sounding records, digitizing them as faithfully as possible, and carrying them around. This list is also a record of that process.