Langevin stereo console circa 1959
Today: from the “Audio Cyclopedia,” Howard Tremaine, 1959: a quick visual survey of professional mixing consoles in service in 1959. A PS Dot Com reader turned me on to the “Audio Cycolopedia”; many copies of this 1300ppp volume are available on Amazon and eBay starting at around $80; based on the number available, though, i feel like there’s a $1 yard-sale copy waiting for me just around the bend… When the moment presents itself, we’ll be sure to run an Out-Of-Print-Book Report.
A Westrex console built for Todd-AO
The Westrex Portable Stereo Mixer, inside+out
RCA Stereo Console built for 20th Century Fox
A ten-channel stereo console built for the production of USAF training films
An eight-channel Western Electric console
Cinema Engineering Console with integral channel equalization. These consoles were apparently introduced in 1951…
…as seen in this image from Radio & Television News, 1951. We’re looking at Capitol Records’ studio in this image.
“Audio Cyclopedia” presents a range of material in an easy-to-read manner suitable for technical and non-technical persons alike; that being said, the book does not shy away from some very useful circuit data, such as the above-depicted Magnasync mixer schematic. I have been wondering for some time what the proper way was to use a 5879 tube in triode mode: here we see: 100k plate resistor with 1K bias resistor. Easy…
9 replies on “Audio Mixing Consoles circa 1959”
The singer in the Capitol studio shot appears to be Margaret Whiting, one of the company’s early stars.
This book is genuinely hard to find, unlike the Radiotron Designer’s Handbook, 4th Edition which is actually much more common. Much of it is otiose today but what is relevant is very good and I would very much like to see it reprinted. I have suggested that a .pdf of both the 1959 and 1969 editions (the illustration you present is actually this, later edition) be included with the current one. So far, to no avail.
Margaret Whiting is more famous for having married unusually unusually, to put it mildly. She was also a trustee of Johnny Mercer’s estate as I recall and wielded considerable power inasmuch as that estate still earns a sum in the same ballpark as the works, say, of Lennon-McCartney.
That distracted unnecessarily from the fact that she was really a fine vocalist, every bit the equal of Tony Bennett or Rosemary Clooney.
I own both the Audio Cyclopedia AND the Radiotron Designer’s Handbook, incidentally, and the Radiotron is actually a much better first acquisition. Only about a hundred pages of the Cyclopedia is of interest to anyone but film sound buffs. It does have a detailed exegesis of the Mcintosh amplifier circuit, and a lot of information about mag tape recording, although a great amount of space is spent on the 3M machine that no one now uses rather than the Ampexes and Studers that are what 90% of modern tape heads run.
Yes, but you can download both the 3d and 4th Radiotrons. The Audio Cyclopedia is tough to find since most have been bought up by the sharks and sent east.
I have many memories of using the western electric console at the Ford Motor Co. recording studio on the 10th floor. Our console resembled the one on the top of your web page. It had talk-back switch , it doesn’t appear on your photo. Also there some very rare tubes in the power supply and amplifier stages. This was used mainly with a Rek o kut lathe and a 350 Ampex 14 reel to reel . The console was also jumpered into equalizers and compressor when needed. The outdput bus was fed to a back room where we had 6 ampex reel to reel recorders which recorded The Automotive Digest of the air. Sadly the studio was closed and the equipment resides at Greenfield Village museum in Dearborn mi.
I own a good ‘used’ copy of that book in the summer of 77. I had a small 4-track studio at the time. Scored it for a fiver. Cheers.
I own a custom built 12 x3 tube console that was built using Langevin/Electrodyne components. It was built for the UCLA theater, fim and television department in the early 60’s. The preamps are 201A’s same as the Langevin 5116B’s but in a smaller “cassette” type housing.
I’m in the process of restoring her right now although really she just needed a good cleaning, a power supply for the lighted Simpson VU meters and connectors soldered back on.
Here is a link to some pictures… http://www.historyofrecording.com/Langevin_Tube_Console.html
I have a Westrex Hollywood mixing console. Number 20 in the series. It is an 8 channel mixer. It was released July 4th 1960 billed as the first fully solid discrete mixing console ever. Westrex 1627-C. Do you have any information on these. I’m getting ready to sell. It was reportedly the mixing console for The Beverly Hillbillies soundstage.
Hi Louis! Did you ever end up selling your Westrex mixer?