andrew dodson

I received an email tonight from a musician friend of mine. I played in the Lexington Brass Band with him. He pointed me to an article regarding the use of auto-tune programs in recording studios. In a nutshell, it’s what makes Britney Spears sound like she’s singing in tune. Or Ashlee Simpson. In reality, they’re beautiful girls who can’t sing a lick. The use of these programs alarmed my friend. My response:

Ken - did you really think these young pop stars could actually SING??? They’re
lucky if their vocal range reaches three notes!

For the most part (keywords), there’s no such thing as a “live” studio recording
anymore. Such is life…

He replied quickly with an amazing account from his youth - involving some ambition and a whole lot of smarts:

Andrew…When I was around 9 or 10 (I started playing the Trumpet at 9) we
built “Crystal Set Radios”. We took a round Quaker Oats Oatmeal box, wrapped
shellac coated copper wire in nice tight-neat rows from about an inch in from one
end to a similar spot on the other end. We inserted one long ‘free’ strand through
a pinhole at the starting point and did the same at our last coil around the tube.

These we made fairly secure although I can’t quite recall how. We took a thin [width]
1/4 to 5/16 inch piece of metal about 6″ long, bent it ->_/_ in the bottom _ we drilled
a small hole and attached it to a flat thin board with a small screw, tight enough to
hold it firmly, but able to move it left and right. Where the top - was, we slipped
the tube under or close enough to touch and bent that angle so it would touch
the ‘copper coils’ for as much of the length of the tube as possible…marked the
touch points of the bottom of the tube to the board…attached the tube to the board,
moved the metal across the arc of the ‘copper coil’ and use a soft pencil to trace
the path…this path was then sanded to remove the shellac and expose the plain
copper wire…our ‘contact radius’ for different lengths of copper wire…then we
mounted a ‘catalog bought’ radio crystal, with a movable ‘needle’ to pick into
any little nook or cranny of the crystal…that needle had a connection wire to
one of the ends of the copper wire…the other end of the copper wire connected,
I think, to a small post from the the crystal and and went on to become the antenna
connection. there was another wire post at which we connected a single small
headphone…there had to be a ground in there someplace, but just can get the image
in my mind’s eye.

The antenna outside had Porcelain insulators at each end…I had about a 35 foot
wire connected between the neighbor’s Cherry Tree and our Garage roof and the
thin lead in wire was also insulated.

You tried to hear a ‘click’ in your single headphone when you moved the needle to
different spots on the crystal…when you found one you moved the metal piece to
‘tune the coil’ for the strongest signal. You had to search an awfully lot to find a
radio station (all were AM in 1947 and all except those in large cities didn’t
broadcast all the time). In the morning, very early…the weather and farm reports
and maybe some news…if anything had happened over night that was newsworthy.
then you would get some music…noon news…very brief…more music and a short
repeat of the news around 6:30PM…then more music. Around 7:00 and for every
half hour would be the ‘old national radio shows’…then they would go off air around
10:00PM. Now, some of these stations didn’t play music in between the early AM,
noon and 6:30PM…they were off air.

When I had to go to bed…too damn early…I would wait until the “coast was clear” and
since the set was right at my window which was where the head of my bed was, I would
put the earphone on my pillow and lay my ear on it and try to find the “big stations”
that did broadcast at night…I could, depending on clear or cloudy night skies pull in
a pretty good variety of stations ( I learned much later on that that was possible because
of AM’s wide broadcast band that could be picked up beyond the horizon and those
really far away, like New York, Pittsburg, Chicago {I was in Northeast Indiana, close to
South Bend and Fort Wayne…kinda in the middle of nowhere} would/could be picked up
because of the “bounce” off the upper atmosphere…well, I found a station that played
music all night…I think the call letters were WWL. They Broadcast live music from the
Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans. Practically every night I fell asleep listen the the Big
Bands and the New Orleans Jazz Bands…and sometimes had a very tender and sore ear.

The music was great although I really didn’t have the appreciation of what I was listening
to.

So, with that kind of background and having nothing but “live” TV in the early 60’s and on
for, how long I don’t know, my mind set was that all music I heard was either ‘live’ or
recorded ‘live’. Even when I was doing “Jingles” for commercials I didn’t realize what
they were doing in the booth…this was back in the 60’s too…did the track for the first
Double Mint..”Double your Pleasure, Double your Fun. Double Mint, Double Mint, Double
Mint Gum” while at Indiana University and the studio was out in the “Woods of Brown Co.”
…they chose IU because the first twins, the Kneezer twins, were the ones that did the
first ‘Double Mint’ commercial and they went to school at IU….pretty much like what
you saw when Nixon was Vice Pres. showing Nikita Kruschev the “Modern American
Home…especially the Kitchens…in Black and White…

We also did some taping of several 30 minute TV shows with the IU Jazz Ensemble and
their Pop Vocal Chorus for the University…did it in a TV studio in Indianapolis…started
mid afternoon and ended about 5:30AM the next morning…take,listen…retake…listen
retake. I have to admit that got old after awhile.

My focus was never anywhere but the music…go in play it…perfectly…(or we did it over
until it was)… then left to go drink some Beer.

It has slowly…very slowly dawned on me that some “fiddling” was done, but I figured that
was for dynamic balances.

Now I find out that there isn’t a Tooth Fairy…life really Sucks sometimes.

I find absolutely fascinating what is possible with the “right tools”…I feel good if I can
oil my valves without spilling oil on my clothes.

Thought you might enjoy the article.

They really can’t sing…in tune? They should pay handsomely for people with the talents
that you have…and when you get older, you can write a “Tell All” book and really ‘cash in’.

Regards,

ken

I really, really enjoyed reading that. Thanks, Ken!