Wonderful Land (minus strings)

[GoldenStreet]

Not far from Abbey Road was Lansdowne Studios in Notting Hill. The story of Lansdowne Studios in the 1960s is told in a recent book by Adrian Kerridge called tape's rolling, TAKE ONE!. Adrian joined Lansdowne as tape assistant on January 5th 1959 and rose to become owner of the studios. For anyone interested in studio techniques at IBC in the 1950s and Lansdowne in the 1960s this book is an essential read. The techniques used were the same as at EMI and Decca and in some instances the results were superior. For example, Abbey Road would have been tied to using tape by EMI. Lansdowne were able to compare brands and opted for a better tape from AGFA.

Alas, Adrian died last November just as the book was about to be published. Copies aren't easy to come by (I bought the last one on the shelf at Waterstones in Notting Hill) but for anyone interested, the ISBN is 978-1-911124-22-1.

From the Amazon site...

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Bill

[Uncleboko]

Didn't it used to be called 'sound on sound' when using a single 2 track recorder which had separate record and playback heads for each track?

IIRC, if without a multitrack recorder, it has to be done by using two mono tape recorders connected together..that's how I did it at home in the late '60's /early '70's..

Absolutely correct, I still have my 1960s B & O 2000 de luxe tape recorder with "sound on sound", which was effectively 2 channel multitrack!

[negninegaw]

So while the first tape was played in the studio, the orchestra played, while listening to it.
And the orchestra's sound was recorded on the second (empty) track of the former?
Or did the Shadows use both tracks to begin with, and a second tape recorder had to be used for the overdub?

[JimN]

So while the first tape was played in the studio, the orchestra played, while listening to it.
And the orchestra's sound was recorded on the second (empty) track of the former?
Or did the Shadows use both tracks to begin with, and a second tape recorder had to be used for the overdub?

For Wonderful Land, the Shadows would have used two-track tape (the basic track is recorded in stereo).

Because this was before 4-track at Abbey Road, the only way to then overdub the orchestra was to copy from that tape to another machine, with the orchestra being added at the same time. This technique was known as superimposition rather than overdubbing.

It isn't easy to imagine the whole string chorale and the horn players wearing headphones. That was never the way that orchestras were dubbed, whether on record or onto a film soundtrack. What seems more likely is that Norrie Paramor (a skilled arranger and conductor) used headphones to listen to (monitor) the basic track on the transfer and conducted the orchestral players, who would have taken their cue entirely from Norrie and the baton as well as from hearing heir own sound in the studio.

[Didier]

And the Shadows weren't there when Norrie Paramor recorded his orchestra, they were on tour, and only discovered the result when coming back...

Didier

[negninegaw]

Thanks Jim, almost unimaginable that the orchestra did not hear the original tape.
And the second tape was stereo again?

[cockroach]

Well, the orchestra players (and Norrie) would have been professional players who could sightread music and follow a conductor to keep time etc...it was ever thus!