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A personal journey, taking in great musicians and great music.
I know that I stated that on Monday, just before it crashed, but I hope that this time, the upload is more robust and the glitch eradicated.
With best wishes
Andrew Kurowski | Editor New & Specialist Music, BBC Radio 3
Room 3015, Broadcasting House, London, W1A 1AA
BBC Radio 3
Well it's sort of there, but ONLY in mono with a sample rate of 22.05kHz and a data rate of a meager 49kbps, the lowest used by the iPlayer for Radio 3. Pretty poor show, what?!
Bryn, unless you know something I don't, all the actual Venuti / Lang recordings (and the Teagardens) were done in mono, as stereo had yet to be invented... OK there are two late Venuti tracks at the end, but the meat of the programme was mono all along.
Indeed the recordings played (as against the commentary on them) were made in mono, and were, of course, analogue and cut using technology which added a fair bit of noise to the proceedings. That the only version of the programme available on the iPlayer restricts the frequency bandwidth to 11kHz, and only devotes 49kbps (as against the HD Sound option which would have used 320kbps) to the audio, necessarily means that the audio captured on the original discs is further degraded (just think of all the data which might be used to represent the music but which is used up reproducing the surface noise, etc.).
Now I expect the lack of an HD Sound option for this programme was on oversight, rather than something intended, by the iPlayer team. Unfortunately, with but 27 hours left of the nominal 7 days availability via the iPlayer, and it now being the weekend, it seems unlikely that the lack of an HD Sound option will be resolved.
By the way, the original (late start) version was available for a while at 320kbps with a sample rate of 44.1kHz. That, however, went when the work started on trying to make the whole programme available.
If there is any chance of the programme being made available in an HD Sound option at this late stage, it would be much appreciated, I feel sure. More of the music's subtleties might then be heard.
I love my shellac, direct to disc cut recordings, all best played in mono but if it's stereo you require you can use it and get different pops and crackles coming out of each speaker
Although I am a great fan of opera, I could never understand why it should be broadcast on radio. As a multi-media art form, surely its place is on television; it should be televised and shown on BBC 4. That's where its true home lies.
It might surprise you to know that not every opera fan has a television.
Otherwise, I can only echo ff's 'If only'.
Actually, it should be on both simultaneously - better sound on the radio, better pictures on the TV.
Incidentally, I find the present disjunction between the USA's summer time & the UK's equally irritating - I've missed an hour of Don Carlos because of it.
I love my shellac, direct to disc cut recordings, all best played in mono but if it's stereo you require you can use it and get different pops and crackles coming out of each speaker
I would advise that anyone who was only able to listen to the low bandwidth full version of the programme via the iPlayer might like to PM me as I might be able to help them hear the late start version in its HD Sound version. Can't help re. the missing early minutes (effectively 18 of them) though.
Given that JRR was in any case shoved back to the 8.30pm slot, I can't see offhand why it couldn't have been moved to the earlier slot: there is less uncertainty about what time the opera begins. That would seem a more satisfactory solution, given that the New York Metropolitan could hardly be expected to alter its timings for one UK station and far fewer than half a million listeners.
It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.
THIS week the R3 movable jazz feast will be at 19.45. Yes, we know you sleepy pensioners will be making model Spitfires out of old egg boxes, but you will have to stay awake. Or at least alive.
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