History of multitrack recording
Because they are carried on the same medium, the tracks stay in perfect synchronization, while allowing multiple sound sources to be recorded at different times.
[1] Each track was recorded one at a time in separate passes and were not intended for later mixdown or stereophony because each monophonic program was unrelated to the next - any more than one random album would be related to the next.
In 1948, Chicago's Armour Research Foundation announced that its staffer, physicist Marvin Camras, had produced a three-channel machine with "three parallel magnetic tracks on the same tape".
Stereo sound recording on tape was perfected in 1943 by German audio engineers working for the AEG corporation.
Around 250 stereo tape recordings were made during this period (of which only three have survived), but the technology remained a closely guarded secret within Germany until the end of World War II.
Much of the credit for the development of multitrack recording goes to guitarist, composer and technician Les Paul, who lent his name to Gibson's first solid-body electric guitar.
Paul's technique enabled him to listen to the tracks he had already cut and record new parts in time alongside them onto first disc and then tape.
A great many of those utilized multiple 3-track sources with the basic band being recorded on the first three, that being mixed down to mono and "flown over" to a second 3-track, leaving two open.
During the group's most innovative period of music-making, from 1964 to 1967, Wilson developed elaborate techniques for assembling the band's songs, which combined elements captured on both four-track and eight-track recorders, as well as making extensive use of tape editing.
Nearly all of the Beach Boys' four-track and eight-track masters from this period are preserved in Capitol's archive, allowing the label to release several expansive boxed sets of this music; The Pet Sounds Sessions (1997), includes nearly all the separate backing and vocal tracks from the album, as well as new stereo mixes of all the songs, while the nine-CD The Smile Sessions (2011) features a wide cross-section of the huge amount of instrumental and vocal material (totalling around 50 hours of recordings) that was recorded for the group's never-completed 1967 magnum opus, Smile.
Thousands of quadraphonic albums were released in the 1970s including Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon and Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells.
'Quad' failed to gain wide commercial acceptance at the time, but it was the direct precursor of the surround sound technology that became standard in home theater systems in the 1990s.
Buddy Holly's last studio session in 1958 employed three-track recording, resulting in his only stereo releases not to include overdubs.
[10] Like Meek, EMI house producer George Martin was considered an innovator for his use of two-track as a means to making better mono records, carefully balancing vocals and instruments; Abbey Road Studios installed Telefunken four-track machines in 1959 and 1960 (replaced in 1965 by smaller, more durable Studer machines), but The Beatles would not have access to them until late 1963, and all recordings prior to their first world hit single "I Want to Hold Your Hand" (1964) were made on two-track machines.
The Beach Boys' acclaimed 1966 LP Pet Sounds relied on multitrack recorders for its innovative production.
Because The Beatles did not gain access to eight-track recorders until 1968, their groundbreaking Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band LP (1967) was created using pairs of four-track machines; the group also used vari-speed (also called pitch shift) to achieve unique sounds, and they were the first group in the world to use an important offshoot of multitrack recording, the Automatic Double Tracking (ADT) system invented by Abbey Road staff engineer Ken Townsend in 1966.
Among the first eight-track recordings made at Advision were the single Dogs by The Who and the album My People Were Fair and Had Sky in Their Hair...
The Beatles used eight-track machines to record portions of the White Album, the song "Hey Jude" and later, Abbey Road.
In 1967, Ampex built its first prototype 16-track professional audio recorder at the request of Mirasound Studios in New York City.
In June 1969 Billboard magazine reported on the proliferation of Ampex's MM-1000-16, with a starting price of $17,000: "[in Los Angeles] local studios ordering 16-track machines are Columbia, Don Costa Productions, RCA, Soul Recorders, Sound Emporium, Sunset Sounds, Vox Studios and LewRon.
"After The Flood", a song from the Van der Graaf Generator album The Least We Can Do Is Wave To Each Other, was recorded at this studio on 16 tracks in December 1969.
Some music producers and musicians still prefer working with the sound of vintage analog recording equipment despite the additional costs and difficulties involved.
The advent of the compact audio cassette (developed in 1963) ultimately led to affordable, portable four-track machines such as the Tascam Portastudio which debuted in 1979.
In the early years of punk, many bands self-produced their own recordings and sold them at gigs and by putting advertisements in underground zines.
The first to be released were rereleased cleaned up versions of acoustic recordings made by the great tenor, Enrico Caruso.
The Mitsubishi recorded their data differently and it could be edited, the old-fashioned analog way, with a razor blade and splicing tape.
These machines like the early home studio TEAC's before them, slashed the prices of professional digital multitrack recording.
The core engine technology and much of the user interface was programmed and designed by Josh Rosen, Mats Myrberg and John Dalton from a small San Francisco based company.
Audacity added to the many free or under $100 solutions available to the Windows platform that run on less expensive but often more powerful hardware.
In a price range between $150 and usually under $1000, superior software mimicking complex recording studios that once could cost $100,000, or more, are also available However solutions this powerful are not needed for most applications.
