I am very new to record collecting, having bought my first LP only a couple of months ago. My main source for LPs is GW, and a few days ago I came across a number of books with old classic recordings. I am not much into classic myself, but my wife is, so good classic recordings have a very high WAF around here.

Most of them seem to be in excellent condition, and I didn't realize just how old these LPs were until I found a dedication dated 1944 in one of the books. Now I am wondering, are these even vinyl or what people seem to call 'shellac'? I use a home brew record cleaning fluid of 4 parts DI water, one part isopropanol and a few drops of Triton X-100 to clean my albums, but in case they are shellac, I guess I'd have to stay away from the alcohol?

Hopefully the photos below will give some clues to tell the experts here what I am dealing with. Also, any further info on these 'Columbia Masterwork' recordings would be greatly appreciated. I have a whole bunch of the books, each of them covering a different composer with about 4 albums.

Many thanks

Frank

http://www.fmueller.com/images/Columbia-Masterworks-5.jpg

http://www.fmueller.com/images/Columbia-Masterworks-1.jpg

http://www.fmueller.com/images/Columbia-Masterworks-2.jpg

http://www.fmueller.com/images/Columbia-Masterworks-3.jpg

http://www.fmueller.com/images/Columbia-Masterworks-4.jpg

The record in your picture is definitely a 78 rpm shellac disc. 1944 sounds about right for the year of release.

Happy listening!:music:

An additional comment about cleaning. Yes, you are correct that alcohol should be avoided on shellac disc. Water and a drop of Dawn dishwashing detergent can be used but be cautious of getting Columbia shellac discs wet. They are laminated (as shown in the picture) and Columbias are prone to have what is called lamination cracks in the surface.

Exposure to moisture for any length of time can allow moisture to enter the cracks and cause the disc to swell and separate. Not a good thing.:no:

Just for your information, a 78 is not an LP. LP means long playing. These classical 78 sets have a side length of 4-5 minutes, which means you have to jump up and flip the reocrd repeatedly in the course of a 20-minute piece.

When Columbia introduced the vinyl LP that we know today in 1949, they said this is a long-playing, non-breakable record. One of their earliest ads showed a stack of 78s about eight feet tall, and the same music recorded on about a foot and a half of LPs. That was the big selling point of the LP record.

Dave - Thanks for the advice! I wonder if there aren't 'lamination cracks' actually visible in my last photo :scratch2:

Also, 78 rpm you say - I just did a short survey of all three TTs I own, and they have 33 and 45 settings - I have only ever used 33 so far. How am I ever going to play these suckers :headscrat

Vinyl1 - Thanks of the explanation!

Last but not least, I bought these to listen to and enjoy, but just out of curiosity, I just had a look on fleabay, and wow - I see Columbia 78 rpm shellac discs for $30 and up! That's actual completed auctions, not just a numbskull's asking price. I paid 30c per disc!

Frank

Thanks for posting pics. Even from here I get a nostalgic feeling of looking at history.

Definitely ... you can find excellent buys at GW and the Classics and Jazz collections seem to be in the best cared for condition.

I just bought two Giants of Jazz collections today: Benny Goodman and Louis Armstrong.

A month ago there were a bunch of Readers Digest and Time Life Classical collections. All clean and shiny, all gone.

Dave - Thanks for the advice! I wonder if there aren't 'lamination cracks' actually visible in my last photo :scratch2:

Also, 78 rpm you say - I just did a short survey of all three TTs I own, and they have 33 and 45 settings - I have only ever used 33 so far. How am I ever going to play these suckers :headscrat

Vinyl1 - Thanks of the explanation!

Last but not least, I bought these to listen to and enjoy, but just out of curiosity, I just had a look on fleabay, and wow - I see Columbia 78 rpm shellac discs for $30 and up! That's actual completed auctions, not just a numbskull's asking price. I paid 30c per disc!

Frank

A Dual 1229 I had played 78s.

A Dual 1229 I had played 78s.

My Dual is a 504 - no such luck :no:

My other TTs are are Mitsubishi LT-20 and a Onkyo CP-1000A. Also no 78 rpm.

Maybe I just put these things away for a while and keep my eyes open for a suitable player.

Frank

Frank,

If you frequent thrift shops and yard sales, you'll find an old turntable with 78 rpm capability. A moving magnet cartridge with a 2.5 or 3.0 mil stylus is best for 78s. Note that a conventional 0.7 mil microgroove stylus won't work with 78s.

Hi,

What you have here are 78 RPM record sets. 1944 is an accurate date on the era of your sets. Columbia introduced the LP record in 1948 and kept 78 sets as an option for a few years. RCA introduced the 45 RPM record in 1949 and there was a war of the phono speeds going on. 1951 was when a truce was declared and RCA and Columbia began releasing both speeds. Just a little history. 78 RPM releases continued until the last US ones in 1960. In many third world countries 78 RPM was continued up to 1967.

Frank,

I would look for an older Dual turntable like a 1019 that has 78 capability.

Some people think that the old 78s should be played on contemporary equipment (the old record changers of the day) but I totally disagree (and I'm one of the ones who used to do this when I was about 3 years old).

I believe that these should be treated to modern, gentler, equipment to preserve the grooves and protect them from further wear.

I use a 1019 with a Shure M78S cartridge and it works fine. You can just plug the TT into the same phono jacks as your regular TT.

They aren't RIAA but it really doesn't matter. They sound fine.

BTW, I have the same Haydn set you show. It is one of the ones my dear late father bought back then when they were new. He engraved my mother's and his names in the runout of each record.

Doug

As Doug noted, they aren't RIAA, but I found using a graphic eq can make them right. I transferred several to CDR earlier in the year with great success. 78's did make use of equalization, but each label used eq in the manner they felt was best. So it varied from label to label.

Those later Columbia 78s usually sound good at 300 Bass turnover and 16 Treble cut, if you should happen to have a variable EQ preamp.

Classical 78s are exceptionally cheap (often free) if you start doing some crate-digging for them. I've got hundreds of 12" Classical discs in the album binders, and I've turned down many hundreds more that were offered free.

If there is anyone interested in Classical 78s, I know a lady here in NW Wyoming that has approximately 500 records in her garage, all Classical, ranging from 90 year old one-sided acoustic discs to RCA Victor and Columbia albums from the 40s/50s. They could be had for very cheap. Shipping and transport is a challenge of course. :sigh: Contact me via PM if interested.

I did some more reading as to the value and it appears that as a general rule there isn't a huge market for them to begin with, and then anything Jazz/Bluegrass seems to be most popular, followed by opera and other classical voice recordings, while instrumental classical music marks the bottom of the barrel. So I guess even if I wanted to sell them, which I am not currently contemplating to do, I probably shouldn't give up my day job quite yet. :D

Shipping for these things has to be a complete deal breaker. As a newcomer to the hobby, I still have a hard time believing just how heavy vinyl is, but these things appear to be several times heavier yet!

Frank

Dave - Thanks for the advice! I wonder if there aren't 'lamination cracks' actually visible in my last photo :scratch2:

Also, 78 rpm you say - I just did a short survey of all three TTs I own, and they have 33 and 45 settings - I have only ever used 33 so far. How am I ever going to play these suckers :headscrat

Vinyl1 - Thanks of the explanation!

Last but not least, I bought these to listen to and enjoy, but just out of curiosity, I just had a look on fleabay, and wow - I see Columbia 78 rpm shellac discs for $30 and up! That's actual completed auctions, not just a numbskull's asking price. I paid 30c per disc!

Frank

I don't see any laminations cracks on the record in the picture with the possible exeception about midway in the record at two o'clock. Those could be scuffs. A lamination crack just looks like a crack in the surface layer. They are usually inaudible and causes no problem.

If you feel the need to clean them, a damp terry cloth rubbing with the grooves followed by a dry cloth will usually suffice.

As far as playback, a vintage Dual, Garrard or Rek-o-kut with 78 rpm speed would make a good turntable. Grado, Shure and Stanton make either dedicated 78 rpm magnetic cartridges or at least have 78 rpm styli available.

I use Stanton 500 cartridges with their standard 2.7 mil conical stylus. I also have a 3.0 mil and a 3.3 mil truncated elliptical stylus (made by different manufacture but designed for the 500 cartridge). Although the Stanton is a stereo cartridge, you can use the mono switch on your receiver to mix the channels to mono.

To adjust for proper equalization, you have several options here. I use an Esoteric Sound Re-equalizer (see garage-a-records.com) which I have installed between my phono preamp and aux input on my receiver. This allows me to set up different curves and mix the signal to mono.

A graphic equalizer can be used instead to approximate the curves. For Columbias of this era, they either used 300hz turnover / -16 db rolloff (at 10 khz) or 300 hz turnover / -5 db rolloff. To recreate these curves, cut the bass frequencies below 300 hz by 2 to 3 db for turnover. For rolloff, cut the treble frequencies by 1 to 2 db for -16 db rolloff. Increase the treble by 4 to 5 db to simulate a -5 db rolloff. Play around with the controls until you get a natural sound to the music. Playing these with RIAA equalization will result in muddy, boomy bass and muffled treble (at least with -5 db rolloff. Treble will sound a little bright with -16 db rolloff).

Hope I didn't muddy everything up for you. But experimentation is what makes 78's so much fun. :D

If you decide you don't want any of them, it's fun to smack them against something hard and see them shatter into pieces just like in a Marx Bros. movie. LPs don't do that nearly so well :)

Just kidding. Get a nice retro cartridge set up and play them the way they should be played; they'll sound a lot better than running them on your modern system.