Tag: vintage microphone

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Pro Audio Archive

Highlights from the 1970 AES Convention, Los Angeles, CA

GRT_deckabove: the GRT 500 audio-tape evaluator c. 1970

Just in case you were too-young/too-hypothetical to have attended, we are pleased to bring you highlights from the 1970 convention of the Audio Engineering Society (via ye olde DB Magazine, r.i.p.).   You can download the whole shebang here…

DOWNLOAD: AES_1970_DB_mag

…and we’ve also reproduced it below for your browsing enjoyment.  Products on offer at that time include: mixing consoles from Electrodyne, Gately, Quad-Eight, Spectra-sonics, Fairchild, Langevin, and Altec.  Opamp labs had kits on offer as well.  Tape machines include 3M, Otari ‘of Japan,’ Teac 7030, GRT 500, Norelco (Phillips) pro-51, Sony Superscope TC-850, and Ampex. Dolby’s model 360 N/R system debuted, as did the Melcor ‘all electronic’ reverb and the Urei LA-3. New microphones on offer included the Electro-voice DS-35 and the Shure SM-53.

AES_1970_1AES_1970_2AES_1970_3AES_1970_4AES_1970_5AES_1970_6AES_1970_7AES_1970_8

Categories
Microphones

Sammy Davis Jr had a crazy fkkn life and he wants you to buy an SM-56

Sammy_1977“Samuel George Davis, Jr. was born in the Harlem section of Manhattan in New York City, as an only child, to Sammy Davis, Sr., an African-American entertainer, and Elvera Sanchez,[9] a tap dancer of Afro-Cuban descent. At age 7, Davis appeared in a film in which he sang and danced with Ethel Waters[10] During his lifetime, Davis, Jr. stated that his mother was Puerto Rican and born in San Juan; however, in the 2003 biography In Black and White, author Wil Haygood writes that Davis, Jr.’s mother was born in New York City, to parents of Cuban, Afro-Cuban, and African-American descent, and that Davis, Jr. claimed he was Puerto Rican because he feared anti-Cuban backlash would hurt his record sales.

“Davis nearly died in an automobile accident on November 19, 1954, in San Bernardino, California, as he was making a return trip from Las Vegas to Los Angeles.[24] The accident occurred at a fork in U.S. Highway 66 at Cajon Boulevard and Kendall Drive (34.2072°N 117.3855°W).[25] Davis lost his left eye as a result. His friend, actor Jeff Chandler, offered one of his own eyes if it would keep Davis from total blindness. The offer was not needed.[26] Davis wore an eye patch for at least six months following the accident.[27][28] He appeared on What’s My Line? wearing the patch.[29] Later, he was fitted for a glass eye, which he wore for the rest of his life.

“While in Community Hospital, in San Bernardino, Davis’ friend, performer Eddie Cantor, told him about the similarities between the Jewish and black cultures. Prompted by this conversation, Davis—who was born to a Catholic mother and Protestant father—began studying the history of Jews. He formally converted to Judaism several years later, in 1961.

“In 1957, Sammy was involved with Kim Novak, a young actress under contract to Columbia Studios. The head of the studio, Harry Cohn, was worried about the negative effect this would have on the studio because of the prevailing taboo against miscegenation. He called his friend, mobster Johnny Roselli, who was asked to tell Davis that he had to stop the affair with Novak. Roselli arranged for Davis to be kidnapped for a few hours to throw a scare into him. His hastily arranged and soon-dissolved marriage to black dancer Loray White in 1958 was an attempt to quiet the controversy.” (SOURCE)

Shure_SM_56The Shure SM-56 (click here to download the specs) was the 2nd generation of the Shure 546, and as far as I can tell they are pretty much the same mic.  We have an 546 at Gold Coast Recorders and it’s my go-to top-of-snare mic.  It sounds pretty similar to an SM-57, but the top end is a little smoother; it seems to mellow things out a bit but without ever sounding dark.   SM-56s and 546s have become outlandishly expensive in the past few years, so if you find a working one of these for under $150, i’d recommend picking it up.  As this 1977 advert shows, the SM56 was sold as late as 1977.

SammyDavis_sm56_1977

Categories
Microphones

Radio Communications Mics of the 1940s part 2

The Electrovoice Cardax Crystal Cardiod Microphone

Today we’ll look at some more microphones on offer to Radio Hams in the pages of QST Magazine circa 1947.  The Electrovoice Cardax pictured above seems to have been a popular choice; this mic appears on photographs of numerous Ham radio shacks of the era.  It is odd then that I have never come across one of these in all my years of digging.  Are crystal mics less reliable than dynamics?

The Cardax again; also pictured is the 910, also a crystal, although presumably an omnidirectional.  Half the price.  Anyone using one of these?

And the Cardax yet again.  Here we learn that the Cardax has a presence-boost switch that adds a 7db peak at 4000 hz to add intelligibility to speech.   Sennheiser notably offers this feature (well, similar enough) in their 441 cardioid dynamic.  Good for use underneath a snare drum. (the 441, that is)


Astatic (seemingly) made microphones exclusively for the ‘communications’ (as opposed to recording or live-sound-reinforcement) market.  The Astatic D-104 is the most iconic of Ham radio mics.  The D-104 consists of a removable ‘head’ that attaches to a transistorized base with a push-to-talk bar.  Above are a few of the ‘heads’ that mate with the D-104 base.  Now that I think about it…  what were these heads used with in the 1940s, prior to the introduction of the transistor?

Above is my D104 base with the working heads that I have accumulated.  I’ve bought plenty of non-working ones as well.  The ‘bullet’ shaped heads are dynamic and the round ones are crystal element.

Here you can see the head removed from the base.  As i said earlier, the base consists of a 9V battery-powered preamp and a large ‘push-to-talk’ bar.  You will usually find these units with a 4 (or more) pin output connector designed to mate with some certain Ham radio transmitter.  I modified this one to have a standard XLR-M output jack. It seems to work fine into any mic preamp.  So…  what can you do if you want to use these heads without the noisy, bulky base?

At some point I came across the 3-pin-Amphenol barrel-adaptor in the center above.  Add a short length of wire and an XLR-M and voila.  Seems to work fine into the mic preamps in my little Mackie test-mixer.  Which I imagine has fairly high input impedance, likely 1500 ohms or more.  Honestly not sure if the performance would be the same into a 150ohm or 600 ohm mic input but…  point is, if you find some of these heads, yes they can be used easily without the base unit.

Alright back into it.  Above is the Astatic Synabar.  Never seen one of these.  Seems to be identical to the EV cardax: same feature set, pricing, etc.

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Above: an advert for the Shure ‘Versatex,’ a plastic-bodied crystal mic.  Great design.  And very rare AFAICT.  To the right we have the venerable Shure “556” broadcast-dynamic mic, one of the better -quality microphones made in the 1940s.  The best modern comparison would probably be the SM-7.    Anyhow, the fire-damaged  556 is depicted here not to sell 556s, but as “a living testimonial to the ruggedness and dependability of all Shure Microphones.”  Presumably this does not include plastic microphones such as the Versatex, which could not fare well in a firey inferno.  The advert goes on add: “For Ham use, we recommend the 708A Stratoliner and the 707A Cyrstal Microhones.”

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And there you have it.  The 707 may look like the famous Shure ‘Green Bullet,’ but the element, and the sound, is completely different.  The Green bullet uses a dynamic element with a property that Shure calls ‘Controlled Reluctance,’ which basically indicates a dynamic mic element that does not require an output transformer to mate with the input transformer of a mic preamp. The 707, on the other hand, is a crystal mic.