Magnetophon

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Magnetophon was the brand or model name of the pioneering reel-to-reel tape recorder developed by engineers of the German electronics company AEG in the 1930s, based on the magnetic recording experiments of Valdemar Poulsen. AEG created the world's first practical tape recorder, the K1, first demonstrated in Germany in 1935.

1 History
- 1.1 Germany
- 1.2 United States
2 As a generic noun
3 See also

[edit] History

[edit] Germany

The Magnetophon tape recorder was one of the first recording machines to use magnetic tape in preserving voice and music. It was developed in the mid-1930s by German scientists, primarily to record the speeches of Adolf Hitler for later broadcast, especially overseas. Since Hitler enjoyed classical music, he probably approved of its use in recording concerts. One of the first concerts to be recorded on a Magnetophon was by Sir Thomas Beecham and the London Philharmonic Orchestra, during their 1936 concert tour. When Beecham and the musicians heard the playback they were amazed at the quality of the recording since it did not have the surface noise of discs and generally was higher in fidelity.

In 1940, AEG engineers J. von Braunmühl and Dr. W. Weber accidentally discovered the technique of tape bias in which the addition of an inaudible high-frequency tone resulted in a striking improvement in sound quality.

Many speeches, concerts, and operatic performances were recorded. Since many of the recordings survived World War II they were later issued on LPs and compact discs. AEG engineers made rapid strides in perfecting the system and had practical stereo recorders by 1943.

One of the more remarkable series of recordings took place at the Vienna State Opera House, also known as Wiener Statsoper, in 1944, when the German composer Richard Strauss recorded many of his famous symphonic poems, including Don Juan, Till Eulenspiegel, and Also sprach Zarathustra, with the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. That same year the Magnetophon was used to make the first stereophonic tape recordings, including a performance of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 with pianist Walter Gieseking and the Berlin Reichsender Orchestra conducted by Artur Rother. This remarkable performance was later issued by Varese Sarabande.

Magnetophon recorders were widely used in German radio broadcasts during World War II, although they were a closely guarded secret at the time. Allied intelligence experts knew that the Germans had some new form of recording system but they did not know the details of its construction and operation until working models of the Magnetophon were discovered during the Allied invasion of Germany during 1944-45.

American audio engineer Jack Mullin acquired two Magnetophon recorders and fifty reels of magnetic tape from a German radio station at Bad Nauheim near Frankfurt in 1945, and over the next two years he modified and developed these machines, hoping to create a commercial recording system that could be used by movie studios.

[edit] United States

Mullin's public demonstrations of his modified Magnetophon recorders in 1947 amazed American audio professionals and led directly to the development of the world's first commercially-produced reel-to-reel tape recorder, the Ampex Model 200, developed by the Ampex electronics company of California, with major backing from entertainer Bing Crosby, who was keen to use the recorders to pre-record his radio shows. Crosby began taping his programs in August 1947. The first tape recorders were very heavy, bulky, and cumbersome, utilizing numerous vacuum tubes.

Magnetic tape proved particularly useful when Columbia Records introduced the first successful microgroove long-playing records in 1948. It soon became an industry standard and tape recorders were used by every major recording label until the development on digital audio tape. Remington Records began making the first commercial stereophonic tapes in the U.S. in 1953, followed in February 1954 by RCA Victor. These tapes were initially released for home stereophonic tape machines. (Columbia began taping in stereo in 1957, followed by other major record labels.) In 1958, with the introduction of stereo LPs, RCA released its first series of "Living Stereo" discs.

[edit] As a generic noun

Magnetophon became the generic word for the tape recorder in some languages including Czech, Polish, Romanian (only for reel-to-reel), Russian, Slovak and Latvian.