September 15, 2020

S Balachander: The Maestro and the Disciple part 1 [HTC 8143] a cassette recorded in India in 1979 and reissued in 1991

Here is a transfer of a cassette released in 1979 featuring the celebrated veena maestro S Balachander and his disciple Gayathri Narayanan, accompanied by UK Sivaraman on mridangam and TH Vinayakaram on Ghatam. 






Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, extensively refurbished and rebuilt to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Digital line out from a MacBook, Focal Spirit One headphones with Schitt Audio Asgard headphone preamp with 4490 DAC


downloads:

highest resolution files I am capable of producing


after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR


highest quality mp3 files possible 





at 4 comments:

MS Gopalakrishnan: Carnatic Violin [HTC 8152] recorded in India in 1973 and issued on cassette in 1993

As a followup to a recent post of a French LP by the Carnatic violinist MS Gopalakrishnan, for this post we have a cassette released in 1993 by HMV. It was recorded in 1973.






Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, extensively refurbished and rebuilt to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Digital line out from a MacBook, Focal Spirit One headphones with Schitt Audio Asgard headphone preamp with 4490 DAC


downloads:

highest resolution files I am capable of producing


after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR


highest quality mp3 files possible 




at 1 comment:

September 12, 2020

Aruna Sayeeram: radio broadcast performance recorded in 2007 in Paris

Here is a very well-recorded and enjoyable off-air broadcast recording from French radio of a performance by Carnatic vocalist Aruna Sayeeram (also spelled Aruna Sairam). At 42 minutes it's obviously not the entire concert, but what we have preserved by the radio wizards in Paris is really quite beautiful.




Recording information:

Theatre de la Ville, Paris
10 november 2007
broadcast on France-Musiques ("Couleurs du Monde"),  27 november 2007

lineage : FM analogic tuner > aif > flac

Aruna Sayeeram, vocal
Lalgudi Vijayalakshmi, violin
Tiruvarur Vaidyanathan, mridangam
S. V. Ramani, ghatam
Bangalore Rajashekar, morsing


1. Padam - Rama rama - Raga Bhairavi - Tala Adi (5:13)
2. Ragam Tanam Kriti - Raga Purvi Kalyani - Tala Adi (30:58)
3. Tillana - Raga Gambira Nattai - Tala Adi (6:06)


16bit, 44.1kHz FLAC file (242 MB)


320kbps mp3 file (97 MB)





at 1 comment:

August 31, 2020

MS Gopalakrishnan: Le Violin de MS Gopalakrishnan [ESP 155 548] an LP released in France in 1977

Here is a lovely LP by the Carnatic violinist MS Gopalakrishnan which was recorded by the French label Disques Esperance and released in 1977. It is volume 5 of a series of LPs which were extremely well-recorded and produced.






Obituary from "The Hindu" newspaper, January 2013:


M.S. Gopalakrishnan — legendary violinist known for his mastery of both the Carnatic and Hindustani systems of classical music — passed away early on Thursday after a brief illness. He was 82.

Hailing from the celebrated Parur lineage, MSG, as he is fondly referred to in music circles, started performing as a little boy, barely eight, along with his elder brother M.S. Anantharaman, also a veteran violinist. He trained under his father Parur Sundaram Iyer.

MSG was among the most sought-after accompanists of his generation, and had a remarkable career, accompanying stalwarts such as Ariyakkudi Ramanuja Iyengar, Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavathar, Alathur Brothers, G.N. Balasubramaniam, Madurai Mani Iyer, M.S. Subbulakshmi, M.L. Vasanthakumari, M. Balamuralikrishna and Maharajapuram Santhanam. As an accompanist, he embellished a concert by complementing the main artist’s ideas with rare sensitivity. He would swiftly interpret the main artist’s musical expressions, and lend support in an absolutely unobtrusive manner — a quality that continues to inspire many young musicians today.

In his career spanning 75 years, he not only broke new ground as an accompanist, but also rose to become one of the best solo violinists in the country, along with Lalgudi G. Jayaraman and T.N. Krishnan. The three are considered the ‘violin trinity’ of south Indian classical music.

Despite enviable success and accolades that came in the form of national honours such as the Padma Bhushan and Padma Shri, and innumerable titles, including the ‘Sangita Kalanidhi’ title awarded by The Music Academy, Chennai, MSG remained a very simple, unassuming person. He is survived by his wife Meenakshi, daughters, M. Narmadha (violinist and prime disciple), Latha and violinist-son Suresh.


Equipment used in transfer:

Preparation: Ultrasonic cleaning for 20 minutes in pure water
Turntable: Audio-technica AT-LP-1240
Cartridge: Shure M97xE
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Monitoring: Schiit Asgard 3 DAC and preamp, Focal Spirit Pro headphones
Software: Audacity, ClickRepair, kid3, and xAct.

  

downloads:

highest resolution files I am capable of producing


after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR


highest quality mp3 files possible 








at 4 comments:

Brij Narayan and Kalinath Misra: live performance in Paris, 2000 (FM broadcast)

Here is another live performance, this time a 54-minute recording of Raga Multani from a french FM broadcast and featuring sarodist Brij Narayan. 




The information accompanying the recording (made at home by "Museum64" which was shared in 2004 is:

Pandit Brij Narayan : sarod
Kalinat Misra : tabla
Marie-Therese Schmitt : tanpura

1.intro W/ interview
2.raga multani
3.outro

Brij Narayan is Ram Narayan's son.

Radio France, Salle olivier Messian, Paris, Fr
October 29th 2000

FM > MD > HDD > FLAC

**upped by Museum64**
12/26/2004

This post only includes the music and does not include the very brief introduction and concluding remarks made by the announcer -- about two minutes of speaking has been removed.





at 2 comments:

August 30, 2020

Vilayat Khan and Avtar Singh: live performance in Montreal, recorded in 1978

Here is a 145 minute recording of Vilayat Khan and Avtar Singh performing in Montreal, Canada in 1978.

This originally surfaced in 2004 on an online torrent site devoted to live recordings. It was later reposted there with some adjustments in 2015. That is when I obtained the recording. A few days ago I made some very small adjustments to the sound (almost all in the first track) to bring out the best aspects of this performance. Hopefully some day the original reel-to-reel recording will be made available to the public. Until then we have this digital transfer of a cassette copy made of the original tape.






Ustad Vilayat Khan - sitar and vocals
Avtar Singh - tabla
Montreal, Quebec, Canada
June 30, 1978

soundboard recording, unknown taper

2004 transfer and seed by (unknown)

May 2015 reseed:
Retracked with minor repairs and volume adjustments

tracklist:
01 Raga Marwa 57:17
02 Raga Bageshri 62:05
03 Raga Bhairavi 26:46


SBD -> reel to reel -> cassette -> Sound Forge -> CD-R -> EAC ->
FLAC 8 w/align on sector boundaries









at 5 comments:

August 23, 2020

Tagore songs over at world music village blog

I have just posted the first of what I hope to be many LPs of songs by Rabindranath Tagore over at one of our sister blogs, World Music Village. 

Head on over there and enjoy what the world is offering!






at 1 comment:

August 7, 2020

Ravi Shankar: The Sounds of India [Columbia WL 119] an LP recorded in the US in 1957 and released in the US in 1958

This is Ravi Shankar's second full length LP album, recorded on the heels of 1956's brilliant and required "Music of India" (later retitled "Three Ragas"). 





It was released as part of Columbia Records' series entitled "Adventures in Sound" which was begun in 1958 ostensibly as part of Columbia's celebrations of the 10th anniversary of their introduction of the LP. This series was one of the first to be devoted to world music on a major record label. Capitol Records would eventually produce a similar series entitled "Capitol of the World" featuring several reissues of EMI India titles.

The album was recorded in New York in 1957 and produced by noted producer George Avakian (uncredited). It was released as an LP in 1958. There have been multiple reissues and cover art changes but this is the earliest available edition.

This was originally conceived as an educational as well as entertaining record, and there is a very basic 4-minute talk entitled "An Introduction to Indian Music" which I have edited out of this transfer. There are so many more educational resources available to the average person 62 years after this album was released that it seems pointless to include this very basic introduction. I have also edited out Ravi ji's very brief identification of the ragas and talas before each piece. I am certain these spoken parts are available on YouTube and also on the CD reissue. 

The liner notes are by noted classical composer Alan Hovhaness.

Of interest to me is this review by Yoshi Kato of the album as part of the book "1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die":


Ravi Shankar's The Sounds Of India was the ultimate mix compilation for classical Indian music, in that it was accessible, gloriously played, and inherently well informed. At a time when tracking down global musical styles took some effort, Shankar was the perfect musical ambassador, one who was already familiar to legions of listeners as both an elder friend and informal musical teacher to The Beatles (George Harrison once called him "the godfather of world music").


Please note two things: this is part of a journalistic genre I like to think of as, "Record Reviews Written With No Clear Evidence of the Record Having Been Listened To." More importantly, Mr Kato seems to be under the impression that the album was released in 1968 (a mistake that Wikipedia repeats). In fact, in 1958, almost no one in the United States knew who Shankar was, and George Harrison was 15 years old and spending his days in school in Liverpool.


Equipment used in transfer: 

Preparation: Ultrasonic cleaning for 20 minutes in pure clean water.
Turntable: Audio-technica AT-LP-1240
Cartridge: ATmono3LP
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity, ClickRepair, and xAct. 






at 4 comments:

August 2, 2020

Vasant Rai and Alla Rakha Play Ragas of Meditation and Happiness [SRV 73013] an LP recorded and released in the US in 1975

Vasant Rai was born in 1942 and at the age of seven began musical studies. At 16 he became one of the last disciples of Allauddin "Baba" Khan, the sarod maestro who taught four legends of Hindustani music: his son Ali Akbar Khan, sitarists Ravi Shankar and Nikhil Banerjee, flautist Pannalal Ghosh, and many others. 





Rai died at the relatively young age of 43, and left only a handful of classical albums which supplement several "fusion" LPs. His collaborations with musicians such as Don Cherry, Carlos Santana, John McLaughlin, and the "world-fusion" band Oregon continue to bring new listeners to his body of recorded work.

Alla Rakha (1919-2000) was one of the towering figures of 20th century music. His collaborations with Ravi Shankar were legendary, but his tabla work was more than just as a partner to Ravi ji. His students included his son, Zakir Hussain.


Equipment used in transfer:

Preparation: Ultrasonic cleaning for 20 minutes in pure clean water
Turntable: Audio-technica AT-LP-1240
Cartridge: Shure M97xE
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity, ClickRepair, kid3, and xAct.

  
downloads:


highest resolution files I am capable of producing


after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR


highest quality mp3 files possible 





at 5 comments:

August 1, 2020

Sandhya Mukherjee: Geetashree [ECSD 2602] an LP recorded and released in India in 1980

For this post we have a delightful LP by Sandhya Mukherjee. Although she is best known for her work in the Mumbai and Bengali film industry, she has recorded several LPS of classical music. 

Born in 1931, she first began studies under A.T. Kanan and subsequently became a disciple of the great Bade Ghulam Ali Khan.

Please see the photos for track listing and accompanists.






Equipment used in transfer:

Preparation: Ultrasonic cleaning for 20 minutes in pure clean water
Turntable: Audio-technica AT-LP-1240
Cartridge: Shure M97xE
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity, ClickRepair, and xAct.

  
downloads:

highest resolution files I am capable of producing


after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR


highest quality mp3 files possible 





at 6 comments:

July 28, 2020

Amjad Ali Khan and Abhijit Banerjee live in Ottawa, Canada on July 6, 1990

For this post we are able to experience music which was performed almost exactly 30 years ago in the capital city of Canada, by sarodist Amjad Ali Khan and tabla maestro Abhijit Banerjee in front of an appreciative audience.

Fortunately, the person providing the live sound that night was able to capture this performance onto audio cassette tape and share it with others in 2005 on the file sharing site named "Dimeadozen" which allows only previously unreleased live recordings.




The original information file (very lightly edited for clarity) accompanying the reposting of the show in 2016 is as follows:

Ustad Amjad Ali Khan - sarod
Abhijit Banerjee - tabla
July 6, 1990
1990-07-06
Southam Hall, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
soundboard master cassette, unknown taper
2005 transfer and seed by (unknown)

June 2016 reseed by zootype:
volume adjustments and repairs

111:21 minutes

disc 1  59:15 minutes
01 Raga Bihag: Alap 27:03
02 Raga Bihag: Gat 32:10

disc 2  52:06 minutes
03 Raga Piloo: Alap 7:47
04 Raga Kirwani: Gat 22:53
05 Raga Khamaj 21:26 


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amjad_Ali_Khan

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abhijit_Banerjee_(musician)


original uploader's 2005 notes: 

--

Ustad Amjad Ali Khan comes from a long line of master musicians in India. He plays the fretless lute, the sarod. He is considered to be one of the top sarod players in India, along with Ustad Ali Akbar Khan and Pandit Buddhadev Das Gupta.

Tabla accompaniment is provided by Abhijit Banerjee, 
a disciple of the great Pandit Jnan Prakash Ghosh. 
Jnan Ghosh has trained some of India's top tabla players, 
including Kanai Datta, Shankar Ghosh, Nikhil Ghosh, Anindo Chatterjee, Samir Chatterjee, and Sanjay Mukherjee.

Amjad was in a good mood that day and in top form. He seemed to have a lot of tuning problems though and I have cut out the fairly extensive tuning segments. 

The Bihag Gat starts and almost immediately there was a tape flip and at the same time they started tuning again so it worked out. I just faded it in as they are tuning and they launch immediately into the gat. This is the complete show.

Technical Notes: 
I worked the sound for this show and this recording is produced from my master cassette recorded off of the (mono) soundboard. 

The level was set a little low so it's a bit hissy in quieter parts but excellent quality and performance. (I prefer lower levels and some hiss to distortion anyway.) 


Fine Print: 
You may distribute in lossless format only. 
You may not sell it under any circumstances 
but may trade (or give it away) freely.


source/lineage:
SBD->master cassette->Audiophile 2496->Sound Forge->Flac8-> 2005 seed

reseed:
volume adjustments [to correct clipping] 
and a few repairs [clicks] made,
no EQ or other processing applied;
new FLAC-8 files and checksum files created and this info file revised;
original info file included.

Thanks again to the taper and original seeder for this recording.

a zootype reseed June 2016
----
new ffp: 
Amjad_Ali_Khan-1990-07-06-Ottawa-tr01_Raga_Bihag_Alap.flac:b8d3d78966bdfc146952a5b50fee4f34
Amjad_Ali_Khan-1990-07-06-Ottawa-tr02_Raga_Bihag_Gat.flac:927755df6012b87b7ee2753b745b1913
Amjad_Ali_Khan-1990-07-06-Ottawa-tr03_Raga_Piloo_Alap.flac:00eed8c924fd19042b87cb85fdecf277
Amjad_Ali_Khan-1990-07-06-Ottawa-tr04_Raga_Kirwani_Gat.flac:583479ac1bd89885d5f5b1ec0e6f456b
Amjad_Ali_Khan-1990-07-06-Ottawa-tr05_Raga_Khamaj.flac:7c28587b82301dfbe4197b77413bc556 
----


In respect to the original's taper's wishes, I am not distributing this in lossy formats such as mp3. When such files are then converted to FLAC or WAV, there is a degradation in sound quality which can not be repaired.


16bit, 44.1kHz FLAC file (576 MB)
This file can be burned to a CD and not lose any sound quality

at 2 comments:

April 10, 2020

The "Oriental Traditional Music" blog is back in a new home

As many of you know, it's been more than a year since Axel Elbin died. He was a great soul who ran the "Oriental Traditional Music on LP and Cassette" blog. He was also a commercial dealer in Indian Classical LPs and CDs -- quite a few of the posts here are transfers of LPs I purchased from him.

 Since the links which he hosted at adrive have now expired, a dedicated group of individuals, led by Gary Pro from Seattle, have come together to host a mirror site. This site will look, act, and feel like the old site, with the exception that there will be no new posts.

 Here is the announcement from the group. I was not involved in any way with the effort to do this and all credit goes toward those mentioned here:


Many of you are familiar with the priceless blog library of music and information called, Oriental Traditional Music from LPs & Cassettes.

The creator of that collection, Axel Elbin, aka Tawfiq, left his body last year. His last blog post was in March, 2019.

Axel stored all of the blog's audio files on public file storage sites...adrive, dropbox, and mediafire.

Axel's subscription to adrive has now expired, resulting in all of those audio file links to now fail. I suspect the same thing will happen with dropbox and mediafire.

Louis Farrugia, Daniel Fuchs, and I [Gary Pro] have worked to preserve this important library of incredible music.

A clone of Oriental Traditional Music from LPs & Cassettes, with all of the audio files, can now be found here:

http://www.rudraveena.org/theBlog/oriental-traditional-music.blogspot.com/index.html

It does not work exactly like the original. The little triangle zip expanders [on the years and months, in the index] do not work, so click the link [name of year, or month] next to it, instead.

This outstanding library must be preserved.

I [Gary Pro] encourage anyone, to use a website copier, such as HTTrack, do download the Whole site, which includes this blog clone. I may be told to take it down, in the future.

So please do visit that site and download what you can. Seek out these precious music files and listen to them and enjoy. 
at 39 comments:

March 3, 2020

Budhaditya Mukherjee: Soulful Melodies on Sitar Strings [Magnasound C4HI0067] a cassette recorded and released in India in 1989

Up next is a cassette from the ever-variable Magnasound label. Frequently these cassettes have one side which is distorted or otherwise unfortunate -- here we can hear that side A sounds much better than side B, although both are very listenable.

Mukherjee should need no introduction. He is certainly one of the very top sitarists alive today. He hasn't made a point in spending a lot of time seeking fame outside of India, which means that he doesn't have the name recognition he deserves.

YouTube has some great videos of this maestro as well.




Sitar: Budhaditya Mukherjee
Tabla: Vibhav Nageshkar

side A;
Raga Basant Mukhari with two compositions in teentaal

Side B:
Raga Bahar with a composition in teentaal
Raga Desh with a composition in ektaal


Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, extensively refurbished and rebuilt to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones



downloads:


24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (1.2 GB)
highest resolution files I am capable of producing. These can be listened to on a computer using software.

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR, or listened to with software such as Foobar2000 or Vox.

320 kbps mp3 files (129 MB)
highest quality mp3 files possible. Use responsibly. 






at 4 comments: