Les Paul Radio Electronics 10 1958

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AUDIO_HIGH FIOELITY

HE scene on oul cover might wellhave been photogi'aphed in a lalgemetropolitan broadcast studio-butit wasn't! This ultra-modern setup

is in a conventional-looking countryhome literally nestled in one of themountain-hills of northern Nelv Jelsey.It is palt of the u'orkshop-home ofLes Piul and MarY Ford, that Pair:who enthlall music lovers and enthuseaudio technicians by using electronicsto multiply their talents.

The vlsitor's first implession is thatof mole mikes than he has ever seenin a br:oadcast studio. Then he viervs tohis left a lat'ge control room on theother side of a plate-giass partition,several bloadcast type tape recolder:s,an ancient piano (obviously from anearly movie theater), a couple of vin-tage phonoglaphs (Edison and Gem)and sevelal guitars.

But the technician is struck chieflyby the big control console that domi-nates the center of the photograph onthis page, ancl even mo1'e bY Les'

A tour through the popular guitarist's stud'iohome reueals some of the equipment cLnd tecll'niques he uses to blend, the electronic and,

musica,l at"ts into his encitittg "Netu Sound"

A small portion of the studio. At Ieft are uvo standard 4tP9* lape le'.""a.""; i.rrt". i. the Monster; at its right the Octopus' flanked by its eightamplifiers and-at the extr.eme right-the power supplies for the equipment.

38

TECHNICIANand

By ERIC LESLIE MUSICIANattitude toward it. Referring to itaffectionately as "The Monster," hesrvings the panel up on its hinges' propsit with an old piece of board kept in-side and points out the 19 low-levelan,plifier:s in its bellY.

The console-a complete control forstereo rvith a third channel if needed

-has a complete set of filters to attenu-ate any part of the audio spectrum, anda fantasticaliy flexible switching andpatching system. An audio oscillator(for checking) forms part of the con-sole, and a vibrato unit (built, inciden-tally, flom the Rloro-Er,octRoNlcsarticle on page 57 of the March' 1957'issue) is built into one end of theconsole.

Les Paul is an altist tvho has madehis way to success by making practicalelectlonics palt of his alt. His "NervSound" (sometimes cal1ed "the LesPaul effect" by audio technicians) is' ofcourse, an application of electlonictechniques, What is not so well knorvnis that Les Paul has been a lesearcheL

and experimenter in the electronic endof the recolding field since early in hiscalieer'-even before his career.

His first venture into electronic musicwas at the age of 13 in his boYhoodhome in Waukesha, Wis. Fascinated bythe family's r:adio-phono combination

-a Kolster-and discontented with thevolume level of his first guitar, he de-cided to combine the two. The Phonocartridge was taped to the body of theguitar, with the sharp needle embeddedin the wood and the output fed into thephonograph input. The experiment wasiuccessful, and Les had a guitar thatwould play at any level he liked, to thelimit of the set's volume control'

From this crude contact PickuP tohome recording was just a step. A tripto Milwaukee netted anqthel pickup anda Westeln Electlic doudle-button mike.An old spring-rvound console Victrolabecame the lecorder. The 13-year-oldexpelimenter placed the new pickup inits tone arm and connected the newmike and old guital pickup to the am-plifiel input. The record blanks weLe, ofcoutse, the plegrooved type availableto experimenters befole World Wal II.Les was not too satisfied with the re-cordings, but remembers that hismother used it later to record him overthe air from WHAD in Milwaukee,where he star:ted to play in 1930' at theage of 14.

The first lecording assignment folwhich he was actualiY Paid, however,did not come till 1931, when he madehis first comnrercial record (Deep-ElmBlues on one side and Just Because onthe other) for ChamPion Records.

Throughout his earlY recordingcareer', Les ahvays sensed somethingnot quite light in his recordings' Pos-sibly the hor.'rible quality of some of hisown boyhood efforts had revealed tohim that-the engineers to the contlary

-a recolding setup need not be auto-rnatically perfect.

Finally, in 7942, during a recor:dingsession with Bing Crosby, he declaredhis opinion. The stuff just wasn't right,he said. A singer shouldn't sound asif he had his head in a i:ain bauel.The recording engineer rvas too much

RADIO.ELECTRONICS

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