Piano Concerto No 4

Rachmaninov Plays His Piano Concerto No 4/Fully Restored Sound

This historic recording from 1941 has been restored to the recording system noise floor, original microphone specifications, and 3D sound for the first time in 75 years.

When Sergei Rachmaninov premiered his 4th piano concerto the reaction from critics and the public was surprise and disappointment. After the triumphs of his 2nd and 3rd concertos, which were steeped in Russian romanticism, nobody was quite prepared for the new work, even though the composer himself was clearly moving in a new direction.

One of the most interesting things about it is the overall structure. This is a concerto composed in the Jazz Age which had such an impact on his contemporaries. Nobody quite expected Rachmaninov, of all people, to write a work that clearly was influenced by George Gershwin. But it was; including the formic cadences, anti climaxes, and asymmetry we find in such works as Rhapsody in Blue. Rachmaninov was very fond of Jazz, and loved to play it for his own amusement. He was a devoted fan of Art Tatum.

Nevertheless,the concerto is unmistakably Rachmaninov in it’s melodic content, even though the form is Jazz-like, and includes a bluesy main theme in the 2nd movement.

This is the only full range recording we have of Rachmaninov.

By 1941 RCA had reached a pinnacle in technology, becoming one of the most advanced electronic companies in the world. They were now deeply involved in sound technology for both radio and motion pictures, and the present recording was made with microphone technology that was fully capable of high fidelity performance. Mastered on direct-to-disk 78s with their « Noiseless » technology, the frequency response is very close to true high fidelity.

The engineering is quite advanced here. With full range microphones it was possible to sculpt the acoustics of the Academy of Music with dampening curtains, baffles, and open seats for sound control. There is plenty of natural reverb here to compliment the hard, punchy tone of the stage. No enhancement was used in remastering. This is all RCA sound quality from the War Era, and it set the stage for the high fidelity standards of the 1950s. By 1943 RCA transcription-based recordings were virtually indistinguishable from tape or film.

A LITTLE FACTOID ABOUT EARLY RECORDINGS FROM THE ERA OF 78 RPM RECORDS:

Early microphone technology used preamplifiers that employed « Radiotrons » (early vacuum tubes) in the gain stage of the process. Like all tubes, the equalization characteristics change as the tubes get hotter and hotter. When these tubes reach their point of maximum thermal tolerance at the top, the performance curve of the tubes flatten out, reducing low frequency performance relative to output. In plain English, the sound gets brighter as the recording process goes on through the course of the session. Look for this on 78-based recordings, especially those made in a single day. The beginning sides will always sound deeper than the sides recorded at the end of the day: it’s all about the tubes.

This recording was mastered with 48 Khz/32-bit floating point audio from 6 tracks, using RS3D Type II..

What is RS3D?

Close your eyes. Can you see the orchestra in the space in front of you? You’re listening to RS3D, which uses the physics of the original recording microphone to recapture the moment, no matter how far back in time that is. There is no reverb or convolution, everything you hear is real acoustics. This is what the microphones actually picked up.