Collectors Of Antique Records

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30578, 22 October 1964, Page 28

Collectors Of Antique Records

The first antique gramophone and record collectors’ convention to be held in Christchurch will convene during Labour week-end to the music of Brahms, Backhaus and Bach produced from wax and celluloid cylinders and old-time discs.

Collectors will proudly present many old-time recordings and show more than 20 handwound gramophones—the latest thing of their day but long since displaced by the electric turntable, stereophonic sound and a 'multiplicity of speakers. Dame Nellie Melba will be heard singing “Lo, Hear the Gentle Lark." Brasby Williams will deliver once again his readings from Dickens. Beebop also will have its place and so will the music hall. Peter Dawson Peter Dawson under the name of Hector Grant will be heard presenting his imitations of Harry Lauder: and Florrie Ford will sing, “Keep on Swinging me, Charlie." Machines on display will include a 1901 Columbia topwind with a 7in turntable and a discreet brass horn, while nearby will be a 1910 H.M.V. Sheraton with a flamboyant 24in brass cone. Also there for the collector will be an 1891 English Puck which spins wax cylinders. The forerunners of today’s diamond stylus will also be on display. Apart from the more prosaic steel needles there will be sapphires and diamonds as used on Edison machines, fibre needles and needles made of cactus thorns boiled in oil. Edison’s Voice Another reproduction will be the voice of Edison—the man who started it all—reproduced on a celluloid cylinder. About 20 collectors from both islands will attend the convention, which will begin on Saturday. The convention includes addresses and discussions on old instruments, including a talk

on the Bettini cylinder carrying the voice of Sembrich Miss P. Rogers, the convention secretary, said this cylinder has been found in Nelson; such a find was almost a world mark in the collecting of old recordings.