[Adrian Tuddenham[_2_]]

The Victor recordings of Jelly-Roll-Morton made in the ballroom of the
Webster Hotel, Chicago, in September and December of 1926 have
incredibly good balance between the instruments.

In particular, the trombone is heard as an accompanying instrument; yet
a trombone can easily be 10dB louder than the rest of the band put
together. The unmuted trumpet and the clarinet sound equally loud.

With a single mic recording (which this almost certainly was), the
balance is normally obtained by altering the distance of the various
instruments from the mic. In the case of the trumpet versus the
clarinet, this seems to be the case (and the trumpet plays side-on to
the mic when unmuted) but the trombone does not sound as far distant in
the acoustics of the room as its level would suggest.

The mic was probably the nominally omnidirectional Wente/Thuras design
which went with the Western Electric recording kit, so there was no dead
side to it.

How have they managed to balance the trombone and still keep it sounding
as if it is in the right perspective?



--
~ Adrian Tuddenham ~
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