603 Repackaging tangos
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2002 17:42:25 -0400
From: Daniel Saindon <gardien@TANGO.MONTREAL.QC.CA>
Subject: Repackaging tangos
Good afternoon
Rick Anderson wrote:
>> My hope is that, someday, someone will figure out how to
>> solve the fidelity problems of the classic age music.
>> Then dancing to long blocks of golden age music will be
>> as wonderful of an experience as dancing to high-fidelity,
>> stereophonic Tango music of later eras. I can only imagine
>> how beautiful the classics must have been played live.
I think that we are there. ( almost )
The technology is there, the editing
softwares are there and numerous, plus what
is most important this equipment, hardware
and software is affordable enough to get.
In Montreal I can provide you the names of
4-5 different tangueros who clean the scratches
hisses and other imperfections of the tangos
they play in a milonga. This is the reason why
most of the sounds of Golden Age recordings
that you hear in the milongas of
Montreal sound very good.
But This process is time consuming and some individuals
may also ask themselves why they do this especially in the
light where they took care of having a "nice"
sound on a tune that sometimes tangueros do
not care about. Tangueros of Montreal are a
fussy bunch encouraged perharps by having
several choices of milongas at their hands.
I do not personnally do this kind of editing
but I know one thing or two, like the MP3 format
is fine at home but does pass the test with
a good sound system of the milongas.
Some will not care about this and will appreciate
the special alterration brought by the compress formatting
of MP3 over the scratches and hisses of the golden age music.
It is for this reason that the wave format is much
appreciated by the amateur sound engineers that I know.
What is perharps surprising is the inability of some
labels to perform a nice editing that could be perfromed by their
studio. The new series of CD from El Bandoneon
comes to mind. They have beautiful, edited old photograph
on their covers ( Picture editing is as much sophisticated now
as the sound could be edited. ), but the sound
is terrible.
As I am writing this, I am listening to EBCD 130 of
early Osvaldo Fresedo 1922-1925, the kind of album
that a lot of aficionados were looking after.
Why ? ( My imagination tells me they sell availability
first, then they will sell a lean track, to make
a greater return on their investment, skimming
the cow in a not very big market )
( I can only imagine a marketing scheme by this big
record company, the marketing shceme is first to sell
the availability of a CD, other company are also
known to reshuffle their tracks, adding only one or
two new tracks: the tango aficionados has the difficult
decision to make if he want to buy a full CD for a couple of
tracks he do not have. This fictional scheme will be completed
when in the enar future, these company will sell the same track
but this time they will serve a clean version, this time
not selling the availability but selling the dediting process. )
Everything has a price even in the world of
repakaging tangos of the Golden Era.
Best regards
Daniel Saindon
gardien@tango.montreal.qc.ca
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2002 23:53:00 +0200
From: Chris Luethen <christian.luethen@GMX.NET>
Subject: Re: Repackaging tangos
Daniel, Listeras y Listeros!
On 9 Jun 2002, at 17:42, Daniel Saindon wrote:
> but I know one thing or two, like the MP3 format
> is fine at home but does pass the test with
> a good sound system of the milongas.
I think this a very important point of interest:
Allthough it seems that it is broadly that that 'scratchy tango
music' will do fine with any sound equippement I would put up the
thesis that "the worser the sound's source the better the system
has to be".
IMHO you can not pay enoug attention to a *really* very good
sound system ... only on which you can enjoy those old "standard"
loud but not noisy!
Christian
[just returning home from a milonga with music played too loud on
a too lousy sound system ...]
Date: Sun, 9 Jun 2002 22:50:35 -0400
From: manuel <white95r@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Repackaging tangos
----- Original Message -----
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2002 12:45:03 -0400
From: Tanguero Chino <tanguerochino@NETSCAPE.NET>
Subject: Re: Repackaging tangos
manuel <white95r@HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
>I also have "El pibe de la paternal", but I cannot get my hands on
>it to play it. When I do, I'll play it and see what it sounds like.
>
"El pibe de la paternal seems acceptable to my untrained ears. Good selection as well. However, EBCD 98, Mala Junta, with a mixture of Pedro Laurenz and Pedro Maffia, is forgetable. Only 5 of the 20 tracks is good enough to even be considered adding to some play list, all of them by Laurenz's orchestra. The other tracks sound like you are listening to radio in the earlier part of the 20th century, or worse.
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2002 15:00:25 -0400
From: Manuel Patino <white95r@HOTMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Repackaging tangos
----- Original Message -----
Date: Tue, 11 Jun 2002 18:29:59 -0500
From: Stephen Brown <Stephen.P.Brown@DAL.FRB.ORG>
Subject: Re: Repackaging tangos
Rick Anderson wrote:
>>My hope is that, someday, someone will figure out how to
>>solve the fidelity problems of the classic age music.
Certainly a worthy goal.
Daniel Saindon replied:
>I think that we are there. ( almost )
>The technology is there, ...
>In Montreal I can provide you the names of
>4-5 different tangueros who clean the scratches
>hisses and other imperfections of the tangos
>they play in a milonga.
I do not want to get too far into a technical discussion, but removing
imperfections and even restoring a piece of a sound wave does not create a
restoration of the original sound source.
I agree that some of the privately mastered CDs and the RCA Victor 100
An~os series do a good job of eliminating these imperfections.
Nevertheless, none of these remastered recordings can come anywhere close
to matching the fidelity of the Daniel Barenboim CD, Tangos Among Friends;
the Orquesta Color Tango CDs, the El Arranque CDs; or the Sexteto Sur CD,
Libertango. Removing imperfections does not restore information that was
never captured on the original recordings. The original recordings made
from the 1930s through early 1950s simply lack the extended bass and high
overtones of more modern recordings.
To match the sound quality of current recordings, a whole new level of
restoration would be required. The technique would be to model the sound
creation process with contemporary sound recordings and use the original
recordings as an input to timing. The process would use the sound from the
bandoneons of contemporary players such as Hector Del Curto's or Raul
Jaurena's bandoneon and the timing of Troilo's playing as inputs to the
modeling process. Such a process would really be an art because the
sounds of Hector Del Curto's or Raul Jaurena's bandoneons are likely
different than Anibal Troilo's. Extend this idea to each instrument in the
tango orchestra, and then to the singer... You get the idea of an massive
undertaking.
Rick Anderson also wrote:
>I don't see the people that dance Tango as a monolithic slab, all
>sharing the same tastes in music & dance styles. I know some people
>love dancing to mostly the classics, ...
Despite the fidelity problems, those of us who love dancing to the classics
do not see as a monolithic slab. Rather, we hear the rich variety of
playing styles in the recordings made by the orchestras of the golden age.
In contrast, the modern recordings offer much higher fidelity but a more
limited range of playing styles. Although some of the modern recordings
are wonderful, most dancers would prefer the rich variety of playing styles
offered by the older recordings the higher fidelity of the newer
recordings.
That said, I think a DJ must use good enough recordings and equipment, and
be careful to mix the orchestras well enough over the course of an evening
that the knowledgable dancers do not come away from a milonga with an
impression that they have spent the evening dancing to a monolithic slab of
low-fidelity sound. I have less concern for those who remain ignorant
about the music and whose primary concern in going to milongas is in
hearing high-fidelity recordings.
With best regards,
Steve
Stephen Brown
Tango Argentino de Tejas
https://www.tejastango.com/
