What Makes the Golden Era of Stereo Recording Golden?

[MylesBAstor]

Vacuum tubes?
Microphones?
Analog?
Acoustics and halls?
Performers?
Spontaneity and lack of or minimal editing and takes?
The producer (s)/recording engineers cared about the sound of their releases? (Did they really know what they had?)


Or wasn't it a Golden Age?

[1morerecord2clean]

Interesting question Myles. And what are the approximate dates of that golden era? And is it golden not just for the recordings but the conductors, orchestras, and performers as well? Think of the treasure trove. Bjorling, Warren, Merrill, Milanov, De Los Angeles, Beecham, Walter, Klemperer, Reiner, monteux, Solti, Vienna, Berlin, NYP, Boston, RCA, London, Angel, Columbia, Hefitz, Horowitz, Rubinstein, DGG, Miles, Coltrane, Goodman, Armstrong, 33 1/3, etc etc etc. should we say 1950 to 1970? Is that the period?

[Rob]

Myles. all of the above.

[mep]

+100.

[tom_hankins]

Agreed, all of the above.

[kensell21]

Ditto

[MylesBAstor]

Interesting question Myles. And what are the approximate dates of that golden era? And is it golden not just for the recordings but the conductors, orchestras, and performers as well? Think of the treasure trove. Bjorling, Warren, Merrill, Milanov, De Los Angeles, Beecham, Walter, Klemperer, Reiner, monteux, Solti, Vienna, Berlin, NYP, Boston, RCA, London, Angel, Columbia, Hefitz, Horowitz, Rubinstein, DGG, Miles, Coltrane, Goodman, Armstrong, 33 1/3, etc etc etc. should we say 1950 to 1970? Is that the period?

Perhaps a little later since we are talking stereo era of LPs that began (releasing anyway) in 1957. So for me was really '57 to say '70. Others consider it '57 to '63. I don't agree but then these people are really talking about the vacuum tube era and consider it a step down when we went to solid-state. Bob Ohlsson on here a while back talked about when Dolby was introduced.

[Joe Pittman]

Like Rob said, all the above. I'd also add the recording engineers being a little more professional/systematic... Kenneth Wilkinson with his Decca Tree for example...

[1morerecord2clean]

All of the above.

[JackD201]

Skill, Time and Money

[Rob]

You should add talent and a good set ears. take a small outfit like Water Lily. basically one guy with scant resources (works out of his apartment) with even more modest training and he was able to beat the majors on SQ (that supposedly had the 'best' resources at their disposal). Kavi's records were spectacular for their realism. Same can be said of many small audiophile oriented labels operating with modest resources (financial and otherwise).

[Bill Hart]

From an American perspective, at least regarding popular music, the golden age of the "studio" was a period when tubes were gone, tracks multiplied like rabbits, outboard processing was a selling point and the engineer was elevated to auteur. It was a golden age in the economics of the studio business, but not necessarily a golden age for sonics. As to live recording, I don't know how much mobile recording set ups (weren't all the great 'in the hall' classical records done by impermanent set ups) followed studio norms, but would think they'd take advantage of solid state for size, heat and weight. Obviously, those precious Neumann tube mics continued to be used even after the switch to solid state.

[Rob]

good point. when i see the words "golden era" my mind goes straight to early stereo classical/jazz records and of course, the great many instrumental and vocal records from the mid-late 50s to the mid-late 60s

[rockitman]

The people, the time period, tubes/analog.

[Guest]

Golden Ears?

[Tapetech]

Vacuum tubes?
Microphones?
Analog?
Acoustics and halls?
Performers?
Spontaneity and lack of or minimal editing and takes?
The producer (s)/recording engineers cared about the sound of their releases? (Did they really know what they had?)
?

The above choices contributed, but are all secondary. As far as rock, pop and jazz recordings, I believe the primary reason for better SQ then was "distant miking" techniques. Today the rule is to get the mic as close as possible to an instrument or singer or not use a mic at all (plug instrument directly into mixer).

[Alrainbow]

Define golden era better is it the music or purely based on sound quality ?
If it's purely sound quality I think there are many examples of today's music being done right like Gary's direct to disk project. Or cookie s label. And others.
To further define I think it is more about a combo of quality and musical content. Less processing overall is part of the golden era based on quality.
Having said that SHM takes golden era stuff that for me in digital just stinks and makes it golden
an example is the stones. Only the SHM is golden for me all other formats I own are subpar
if what I posted above is true to others then it's what was done wrong at the time.
Music today if done right is very good but to be honest digital is not analog period.

[david k]

The Golden Age!

david

[JCOConnell]

tubes, all analog equipment. purist miking techniques.

[MylesBAstor]

tubes, all analog equipment. purist miking techniques.

What do you consider purist making techniques? I don't think the old recordings were quite as simply miked as some people suggested. Sadly, lot of that stuff is a myth like I wrote about for TAS in 1987. Like the RCAs for instance. Only simply miked early stereo RCAs were the early experimental recordings done in '53 and '54. Of which interestingly, the Reiner and CSO was actually the third and was done on a 30 ips machine. Kind of amazing though to think of since Ampex tape machines were only seven years old and the stereo ones even younger.

[JCOConnell]

What do you consider purist making techniques? I don't think the old recordings were quite as simply miked as some people suggested. Like the RCAs for instance. Only simply miked RCAs were the early experimental ones in '53 and '54. Lot of that stuff is a myth.

by purist, I guess I meant minimal miking techniques. They weren't like the later multitrack recordings of the 70's where they put a mike on nearly every instrument.