When Did Radio Stations Start Recording In Stereo?

[richardfinegold]

I've been tempted by some live broadcast CD issues of George Szell. from Salzburg and Lucerne, from the 50s and 60s. I bought one Saltzburg disc of Beethoven and Bruckner from 1961 and 1965 (Bruckner 3, Beethoven 5th Symphony and PC with Nikita Magalof and some Overtures). The advertising trumps the fact that they use 24 bit remastering but the disc is unfortunately in tubby mono. I suspected that would be the case when I purchased it so I am not really complaining and after a few minutes the ear adjusts and one become enveloped in the music but it is misleading advertising. imo when the source material is this limited the remastering might as well be a mp3 file, as one can't make chicken soup from chicken s....
My question is at what point did most major radio broadcasting start to use stereo? It is disappointing to find many of the BBC Legend discs from the early 70s still using mono. Otoh I have some Kubelik/Bavarian RSO discs from the late 70s (Mahler 1 and 9) that sound excellent, beating the Kubelik studio performances from the 60s both sonically and musically. Granting that the change over would not have been a universal date, that for example the BBC may have changed at either an earlier or later date than say the Bavarian Radio, but what date would be a reliable timeline for a prospective purchaser of historical broadcast material?
(excepting the USSR) where one could reasonably assume the material would be in reasonably recorded stereo? As noted above one cannot go by the advertising information for the discs themselves.

[Petrushka]

I've been tempted by some live broadcast CD issues of George Szell. from Salzburg and Lucerne, from the 50s and 60s. I bought one Saltzburg disc of Beethoven and Bruckner from 1961 and 1965 (Bruckner 3, Beethoven 5th Symphony and PC with Nikita Magalof and some Overtures). The advertising trumps the fact that they use 24 bit remastering but the disc is unfortunately in tubby mono. I suspected that would be the case when I purchased it so I am not really complaining and after a few minutes the ear adjusts and one become enveloped in the music but it is misleading advertising. imo when the source material is this limited the remastering might as well be a mp3 file, as one can't make chicken soup from chicken s....
My question is at what point did most major radio broadcasting start to use stereo? It is disappointing to find many of the BBC Legend discs from the early 70s still using mono. Otoh I have some Kubelik/Bavarian RSO discs from the late 70s (Mahler 1 and 9) that sound excellent, beating the Kubelik studio performances from the 60s both sonically and musically. Granting that the change over would not have been a universal date, that for example the BBC may have changed at either an earlier or later date than say the Bavarian Radio, but what date would be a reliable timeline for a prospective purchaser of historical broadcast material?
(excepting the USSR) where one could reasonably assume the material would be in reasonably recorded stereo? As noted above one cannot go by the advertising information for the discs themselves.

Others may be able to answer with more authority but my understanding is that the BBC started broadcasting in stereo in 1966. However, some concert relays were recorded in experimental stereo, such as the magnificent Horenstein Mahler 8 in 1959. Other BBC Legends issues were done in stereo in the early 1960s but it was rather slow to take over and mono still ruled for some years. By 1970 I think that R3 was, more or less, fully stereo.

The Austrian Radio s similarly patchy. I have Salzburg VPO/Böhm discs set down in stereo in 1966 but later ones are frustratingly in mono. Ditto, T think, Bavarian Radio. The key year does, therefore, seem to be 1966.

[Bryn]

Google stereophonic sound. The Wikipedia article has the first BBC experimental stereo broadcast as dating back to 1925!

[Gordon]

In the UK the BBC did not start regular stereo [even then not all content was stereo] in the London area from Wrotham until July 1968. It took until the early 70s for the FM transmitter networks to offer stereo across the whole country. In other parts of the world eg cities the USA it is possible that stereo arrived sooner - there is one example from 1961 in the Wiki page on FM broadcasting - because of the different regulatory situation there and simpler transmission networks.

Experiments took place in the London area as early as 1958 [see below about LPs] but no international standard existed at that time; the Zenith-GE system was eventually trialled and then adopted in 1962. Part of the problem was the quality at that time of getting matched lines from studio to transmitter, these were supplied by the GPO and were hard to maintain to the required standard.

It follows then that the studio systems - including not just recorders but mixers too together with cabling etc- would not begin any regular recording until about the same time and, even if it did, it would start, as with all these things, in London. However equipping the concert halls eg RFH for "outside broadcast" stereo would not occur as fast. I worked in the BBC Research Department in 1966 and we had an EMI BTR3 stereo machine there, built to BBC specifications, with a number of experimental tapes made at Maida Vale. The purpose was to evaluate what the network technical specifications should be for stereo nation-wide operation.

Many other broadcasting organisations around the world would be slow to adopt full stereo production facilities, some late in the 1970s. Whereas commercial record companies had the freedom to act more or less independently, broadcasters, particulalrly public service ones like the BBC and many other European equivalents, had government oversight and regulation. There was also the matter of international standards. Also the public, always slow to adopt new technologies back then, would have to equip themselves with new receivers.

Professional stereo recording machines would have been available since at least the late 50s - stereo LP did not start uintil September 1958 - and the record companies had been slowly stockpiling stereo masters since 1954 but were by no means recording everything in stereo until about 1956/7. This use of stereo would not extend from London studio facilities for some years.

EMI, as one example, in the UK issued some of these earlest stereo recordings on "StereoSonic" tape recorded at 7.5ips. Record companies issued separate mono and streo verions until the late 60s.

This is worth a read of you are interested in learning more:

http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/BBC/PCMandNICAM/History.html

As regards the BBC using stereo in 1925 radio had barely got going at all - there was no BBC as we know it, it was a commercial Company with limited reach and electrical disc recording had only just been adopted by the record companies using mono - let alone in such a technological innovation as stereo and the transmisson format of the time was narrow-band Amplitude Modulation.

[pastoralguy]

Fantastic information. Thank you.

[richardfinegold]

Others may be able to answer with more authority but my understanding is that the BBC started broadcasting in stereo in 1966. However, some concert relays were recorded in experimental stereo, such as the magnificent Horenstein Mahler 8 in 1959. Other BBC Legends issues were done in stereo in the early 1960s but it was rather slow to take over and mono still ruled for some years. By 1970 I think that R3 was, more or less, fully stereo.

The Austrian Radio s similarly patchy. I have Salzburg VPO/Böhm discs set down in stereo in 1966 but later ones are frustratingly in mono. Ditto, T think, Bavarian Radio. The key year does, therefore, seem to be 1966.

I've never heard that legendary Horenstein Mahler 8, but my understanding was that the BBC Legends issue was in mono. I have Horenstein conducting Mahler 9 and Nielsen 5 on the same label, both from the very late 60s or early 70s, and both are in mono.

[richardfinegold]

Google stereophonic sound. The Wikipedia article has the first BBC experimental stereo broadcast as dating back to 1925!

I had read that the earliest stereo experiments were made by Allan Blumlein (sp? I didn't check) from Bell labs in the 1930s.

[richardfinegold]

In the UK the BBC did not start regular stereo [even then not all content was stereo] in the London area from Wrotham until July 1968. It took until the early 70s for the FM transmitter networks to offer stereo across the whole country. In other parts of the world eg cities the USA it is possible that stereo arrived sooner - there is one example from 1961 in the Wiki page on FM broadcasting - because of the different regulatory situation there and simpler transmission networks.

Experiments took place in the London area as early as 1958 [see below about LPs] but no international standard existed at that time; the Zenith-GE system was eventually trialled and then adopted in 1962. Part of the problem was the quality at that time of getting matched lines from studio to transmitter, these were supplied by the GPO and were hard to maintain to the required standard.

It follows then that the studio systems - including not just recorders but mixers too together with cabling etc- would not begin any regular recording until about the same time and, even if it did, it would start, as with all these things, in London. However equipping the concert halls eg RFH for "outside broadcast" stereo would not occur as fast. I worked in the BBC Research Department in 1966 and we had an EMI BTR3 stereo machine there, built to BBC specifications, with a number of experimental tapes made at Maida Vale. The purpose was to evaluate what the network technical specifications should be for stereo nation-wide operation.

Many other broadcasting organisations around the world would be slow to adopt full stereo production facilities, some late in the 1970s. Whereas commercial record companies had the freedom to act more or less independently, broadcasters, particulalrly public service ones like the BBC and many other European equivalents, had government oversight and regulation. There was also the matter of international standards. Also the public, always slow to adopt new technologies back then, would have to equip themselves with new receivers.

Professional stereo recording machines would have been available since at least the late 50s - stereo LP did not start uintil September 1958 - and the record companies had been slowly stockpiling stereo masters since 1954 but were by no means recording everything in stereo until about 1956/7. This use of stereo would not extend from London studio facilities for some years.

EMI, as one example, in the UK issued some of these earlest stereo recordings on "StereoSonic" tape recorded at 7.5ips. Record companies issued separate mono and streo verions until the late 60s.

This is worth a read of you are interested in learning more:

http://www.audiomisc.co.uk/BBC/PCMandNICAM/History.html

As regards the BBC using stereo in 1925 radio had barely got going at all - there was no BBC as we know it, it was a commercial Company with limited reach and electrical disc recording had only just been adopted by the record companies using mono - let alone in such a technological innovation as stereo and the transmisson format of the time was narrow-band Amplitude Modulation.

Second what PG said Gordon, and I was hoping that you in particular would see this thread. So, in your opinion, in answer to the original question, at least with respect to the BBC, what do you think would be a 'safe' cut off date when one could assume that a historic Recording would have a 90% chance of being in Stereo?

[PJPJ]

I've never heard that legendary Horenstein Mahler 8, but my understanding was that the BBC Legends issue was in mono. I have Horenstein conducting Mahler 9 and Nielsen 5 on the same label, both from the very late 60s or early 70s, and both are in mono.

The Horenstein Mahler 8 is definitely in excellent real stereo. Some BBC Legends releases relied on home taping as the BBC wiped some of the recordings, and now exist only in mono.

The Mahler 6 and Nielsen 5 were recorded in Bournemouth - Hornspieler will I hope give chapter and verse why they exist only in mono.

Some of the very recent Lyrita Itter Archive recordings of BBC broadcasts are late 1960s and early 1970s mono, either because that's how they were broadcast or there wasn't a stereo signal in Burnham.

[Gordon]

I had read that the earliest stereo experiments were made by Allan Blumlein (sp? I didn't check) from Bell labs in the 1930s.

Alan Blumlein originally worked for UK Columbia in the late 20s but joined EMI's Labs when HMV and Columbia merged in 1931. At that time Columbia and HMV used Western Electric [ie Bell] recording chains and paid a hefty royalty per disc pressed for the privilege.

In 1931 Alan Blumlein circumvented the WE patents and thus freed EMI from the royalties. His experiments on Stereo also dated from this time and his seminal patent is dated 1933. When in 1957 Arthur Haddy of Decca confronted Dr Freyn of RCAVictor over stereo disc standards the good Dr, who thought his company had control of the technology, was rendered speechless when Haddy showed him Blumlein's 1933 patent; it would seem that Victor had never seen it.

There are at least 2 biographies for Blumlein that are worth reading

The Inventor of Stereo: The Life and Works of Alan Dower Blumlein, Robert Charles Alexander. Focal Press, 1999, ISBN-13: 978-0240516288 and

The Life and Times of A D Blumlein, Russell Burns, IEE History of Technology Series, 2000, ISBN-13: 978-0852967737

the one published by the IEE here in the UK is the better of the two and provides much technical detail. It describes Blumlein's major contribution to the EMI/Marconi electronic Television standard [the 405 line system] used by the BBC from 1936 and remained in use until 1984.

Now many years before this in the late 19thC a Frenchman, Clement Ader, had arranged to place microphones [telephone mouthpieces] across the stage of a theatre and relay their ouputs via telephone lines to subscribers. The system worked and is reckoned to be the first commercial use of "stereo" where the subscribers held two earpieces of a telephone "handset" to hear two channel sound. Blumlein's contribution was in recording the two signals in a common groove of a disc. It also had practical application in film for the cinema.

Although Blumlein was working in the UK for EMI there were other workers at Bell in the USA at the same time. On its formation EMI had inherited a major shareholder from HMV - RCA VIctor and the Director of EMI representing this interest was none other than David Sarnoff. Sarnoff would have known about Blumlein's patents and indeed there was a patent sharing agreement between the companies that lasted until RCA split from EMI in the early 1950s.

PS: It is worth noting that Beecham and the LPO were recorded on BASF tape in stereo in 1936 during a tour of Germany - the recording is still available out there somewhere - I have the LP that EMI issued. The machine was probably an early version of the Magnetophon that was used by the RRG during the war and the machine the allies discovered and acquired. There were supposed to be many stereo tapes made in the 1940s but only a few have survived eg Karajan's Bruckner and Eroica [still available?]. It is believed that the Russians acquired most of them at the end of the war and some were eventually returned and issued by DG but very few stereos seem to have survived.

[Gordon]

Second what PG said Gordon, and I was hoping that you in particular would see this thread. So, in your opinion, in answer to the original question, at least with respect to the BBC, what do you think would be a 'safe' cut off date when one could assume that a historic Recording would have a 90% chance of being in Stereo?

Quite hard to say with any confidence but I'd guess the late 60s perhaps as early as 68 but possibly as late as 1970.

It is quite clear that recording experimentally and broadcasting are two different things and I suspect that the 59 Horenstein stereo referred to above was experimental and one-off with no prospect of it being broadcast in full simply because of the very primitive means a listener would have to receive and render it. As I said first time around above they could easily have acquired stereo recording machines which would stand alone within the system and perhaps be located at a few favoured places like London concert halls or, as was the case by 1966, at Maida Vale. Universal usage all around the BBC system would be expensive and impractical at that time.

Recording at studios like Maida Vale or locations like the RFH or RAH [Proms] did provide opportunities for true stereo masters to be made from as early as 1958. The purpose would be for transmission later, especially when the stereo network was up and running nationally but to do that extensively that early would have required considerable investment and insight into how the FM stereo system eventually chosen and implemented would progress. There are various dates given for the first [on R3 and its predecessors] "regular" stereo transmissions from August 1962 to July 1968. I guess it depends what you mean by "regular" [eg how many hours per day] and how many listeners could get it.

Only when the Wrotham transmitter was fully operational in "reliable" stereo [1966, when new microwave links replaced the poorly performing GPO land lines] could anyone at home around London make a good off air tape recording of BBC output. Before that the occasional stereo would be less than ideal.

I lived and worked in outer London from 1967 and had a Revox which I used to record Proms etc - not many broadcasts were actually in stereo at that time. One has to remember also that stereo required a very consderable improvement in C/N for a tuner to deliver low noise output similar to the mono case. This meant a very good outdoor antenna.

My information on dates comes from a history of BBC Transmission written by senior engineers who were present and involved personally at the time.

[Gordon]

....The Mahler 6 and Nielsen 5 were recorded in Bournemouth - Hornspieler will I hope give chapter and verse why they exist only in mono.

More than likely this was because the BBC had no stereo machines [and trained staff to use them] for use in Bournemouth. Why were they made in Bournemouth anyway given that M8 had been done on London. What venue?? It would need to be expansive to cope with the forces in M8.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Why were they made in Bournemouth anyway given that M8 had been done on London. What venue?? It would need to be expansive to cope with the forces in M8.

Mahler 8 with the LSO in the Royal Albert Hall.

Mahler 6 with the Bournemouth SO in the Winter Gardens, Bournemouth.

(The Nielsen 5 is with the New Philharmonia, recorded in "BBC Studios"; recorded in February, 1971, it's in stereo.)

[Gordon]

Thanks. RAH makes sense - just as for Bernstein in the same piece.

Anyone got BBCL 4051-2, a live Mahler 7 with New Philharmonia and Horenstein on August 29th 1969?

[Bryn]

The first experimental stereo broadcast was in December 1925 from Daventry (5XX). Hamilton Harry conducted.

"The 5XX longwave transmitter beamed the right hand channel and all the local BBC medium wave transmitters including 2ZY broadcast the left hand channel."