Sylvia, welcome back to the podcast. Hi. Gosh, it’s been a while. It’s been a very long while. Yeah, it’s been since 2015. You were on episode 14. This is episode 616. Oh, wow. Well. Congratulations, Matt. Geez, you’ve been busy. I’ve been busy. Yeah, I’ve been talking a lot. Talking to a lot of our friends.

Well, let’s let’s get this state of the state. Where are you at now? And tell me about this studio that you’re at. In about 2015. I moved from Weed up to Ashland, Oregon. I already had some established friends and stuff in Ashland, so it was an easy move and started a studio in a church and had that running for a few years, about five years. And then now I’m in a place on a street in Ashland, and it’s kind of the arts district, and it’s an old converted radiator shop, five bay garage.

It’s big, you know, concrete building, and half of it is. We’ve turned into a really nice studio and it’s I’ve got the, you know, here’s here’s the control room part and I’ve got some great gear here. I sold my old Neve, you know that 88 custom. So that’s gone away. And I replaced it with this beautiful thing and it and it works great. So I continue to work and just mix and do art and write books.

Okay, so Ashland, Oregon, why did you pick Ashland? Because there’s a guy up here. That’s the reason why I moved out of LA to move up to Weed was I met a guy and got married and, you know, but that didn’t work out. And now I got a new guy, and he’s really great. And his name is Chris Johnson, who we’re going to get into the book, of course, at some point here.

But Chris is the coauthor of the book. Right? Yeah. And Chris has been a big part of, of my life for a long time. So he was the manager at Radio Star Studios in Weed and did a brilliant job there and also helped build this place. I mean, he actually has built it himself, and he’s managed to do some crazy negotiations where he managed to buy us a a microphone museum.

So yeah, lots of microphone talk to be had here. Well that’s great. Such a symbiotic relationship between you and Chris. I mean, obviously, you know, you’re not only life partners, but but just business partners, too. It seems it’s accurate. Yeah. And we can we just get along, you know, it’s it’s easy. We can be in an office for hours and hours and just be fine. You know, we never really. Well, we get tired of each other. Of course, like married people do. But no, we we we are very well paired.

Excellent. Well, so let’s talk first about the microphone collection that you got. Because if if I recall right, you bought a collection from somebody and I. And I’m completely spacing on that person’s name. Can you talk about that. Yeah. Well what happened was in 2015 we had another book come out called Recording Unhinged. And it, it, it did pretty well over the years since 2015. And the publisher asked us to, to write a book about microphones. And I have a lot of microphones. So I thought, well, that’s going to be right in my alley. How hard is it going to be to write a book about microphones? And Chris was on board.

He started sending me out to different places to do interviews. So I went to Europe and met the people at Neumann and went to the in the former East Germany and went to their factory and went to the sugar factory and went around the United States quite a bit. Every chance I could, I would go visit these, these little museums and collections. And there was this guy up in Milwaukee named Bob Paquette, and he had a huge collection of over 3000 microphones, historic. He was an old radio guy, so he had a huge collection of not only microphones but radio equipment. And he had a sound company for about 50 years.

I went to visit his collection, was in awe, and realized that in order to do justice, I would have to come back and spend a week researching his library and going through and photographing these microphones. But before I had a chance to come back to Milwaukee, the old guy, Bob, passed away. I mean, he was an old fella and I had made friends with his son, his family, actually, and the family asked me and Chris if we could help find a home for this microphone collection.

They wanted to keep it together if they could. Anybody who was interested in buying really wanted to cherry pick all the Neumanns and the Telefunkens out of it and leave all the historic stuff to just be kind of picked apart. And so I don’t know how he did it, but Chris managed to negotiate with the family a way that we could pay off the collection. It was a big chunk of change, but we did. We paid it off over time.

And then realizing when the mics came to our place here, we realized that the whole idea of writing a book about microphones, whatever we had known about microphones before, was just not even sufficient at all. We had to start over with the book because there was so much more that I didn’t know. Just, you know, in my career, because I’ve been a music producer and I use microphones in my work, I think I know a lot about microphones, you know, just how to use them and how they work. But in fact, there was so much about the history of microphones and how the technology developed that I had no idea about, and the American history of microphones is really fascinating.

There’s so much most people don’t know how much technology came out of the early days, came out of the United States. The book, I want to just mention the title to everybody. So the book is called The Great Book of Vintage Microphones by Sylvia Massy and Chris Johnson. The first 100 years of visual tours. And it actually it starts in the 1870s, it seems, and moves forward. I just started to flip through and I was like, oh my gosh, one could spend a long time looking at this. I cannot imagine the amount of effort that you put into it. It was a lot of work.

We did the research and photographed the collection. We have most of the mics here, but there’s many mics that I documented from EMI’s collection, like the Royal microphones are featured in the book. There’s a lot to absorb in there. And I tried to cover, you know, all the high fliers to the ones that we use in music production. Those are all in there. Well, a lot of them are in there. They’re not all in there because the volume is not big enough. I mean, here I got a copy of the book right here. I mean, it is pretty thick, but yeah, but only 600 microphones in this book. There’s many, many more microphones. Many more books to write.

What are some of the things that surprised you in the research of this, that that you thought you knew about microphones? But I bet you know a whole hell of a lot more now. Can I just tell you some things about microphones? Tell me. Okay, well, first of all, I have to go get at least one microphone to show you, and I’m going to grab it out of the case right here.

Okay? I’m back. This is so much fun for me. So this right here — we’re talking about the 1870s is when the first microphones came in. And that was Alexander Graham Bell and his liquid transmitter. But right after that everybody was jumping in and trying these new technologies and finding new ways to transmit speech. It was really exciting time. So 1877. I think that’s the date that David Edward Hughes developed this microphone, which is the loose contact carbon 1877. It’s made out of wood. This is made out of wood. Have you ever seen a microphone that’s made out of wood. Wow. Look at that.

Anyway, this is really what it is: inside here is that stick. There’s a stick that’s suspended loosely. It kind of rattles along. And it’s right between these two points here. And you take a wire and you connect on one side to a battery. And on the other side you connect it to a little like an earpiece. Right? And then so it goes earpiece and then a wire to the battery and back around to the bottom here. Now you got a microphone. That’s it. This is a carbon microphone. If you’ve heard of the phrase carbon microphone this is the first carbon microphone. It was a stick. It’s a frickin burnt stick. That’s what it is.

Yeah. So really the first microphone was like a burnt stick. And then there was another kind of microphone called the crystal, which is a piezoelectric crystal technology, which is a very thin wafer, a little slice of a salt crystal. And it’s just a rock. So, you know, here we’re yelling into sticks and then you’re yelling into rocks, you know? And so the first microphones were sticks and rocks. Isn’t that crazy?

It is crazy. And so, like, you know, some of the younger audiences probably not going to be familiar with this, but, you know, in the old days, we all used to have house phones, you know, when you’d unscrew the bottom — that mic there, was that a carbon microphone? Yeah. That little thing — I gotta show you. I can go grab it. Bring it. Okay.

Yeah. So here’s a telephone. Right. One of these old telephones. Right. Exactly. Yeah. You can find them in thrift stores and stuff. Anyway, this was a carbon microphone, and it was in the mouthpiece here, I think. Let’s see if I can open this up and we can look at that button. But yeah, the simple technology. Well there it is. It’s kind of stuck to the plastic. But this was the microphone element. And this was a carbon. There’s carbon inside that. So this technology was going on for a long time all the way into the 80s, 90s, you know, until the mobile phone came in, I think. Carbon microphones. Amazing.

Were there any microphone surprises to you that you had no idea existed in this collection in your research? The way that condenser microphones developed is really fascinating to me. And it became, well, let’s say the first ones were — can I grab another thing, please? Yeah. Okay. I love the show and tell. Okay. Now I’m going to show you the condensers and kind of the development of the condensers and how they started with the first and then how they developed into the pencil condensers that we use. And I’ll grab it.

Okay. Those listening and not watching this will give you some motivation to go check out the YouTube channel. Oh my God, it’s so much fun showing microphones. Actually, I have another camera and I’m going to flash it over to the other side of the room where you can see the whole collection. Some of it anyway. Oh my God. And it goes on and on and on. Oh, it’s not going to turn for me. But anyway, there you go. I’m sure storage was a consideration for this collection. Yeah. Yeah. There’s a lot of shelving and a lot of glass cases.

So the development of the condenser microphone is really fascinating. And the first ones were kind of suspended like the old carbons. Carbons used to be suspended in a ring like this. But this was highly sensitive new technology and it required a power supply. And so this early condenser is from Western Electric. And it had a power supply in the base in a wooden box. But as time went on, the condensers got smaller. And this is from the 40s, early 40s, late 40s, I think. But you can see like this is another Western Electric. Now the condenser capsule is only that big and it’s removable. So you could have different types of capsules. You can have your omni and your cardioid but this had tubes inside of it. So this was really streamlined for the day. It’s all full of tubes.

What year is this? Oh man. The date for that was 1942. Was that Western Electric? But what happened was as people got more interested in using these high end condensers, is that the bodies would get smaller and smaller. So this still has that same Western Electric 640 AA capsule, but it’s on a much smaller body. And now the tubes were becoming miniaturized and they would fit inside these smaller bodies.

So as the tubes got smaller the microphones could get smaller too. So you could see the transition — it took about 30, 40 years, but it went from a big bulky thing in a wooden box down to this very streamlined. And now you can compare that to an AKG 451 or 452. And you see how it developed.

Much earlier in the development of microphones, polar patterns were a consideration. What happened was in the teens, there was a fellow named Jensen who worked for Magnavox, and he took a handheld microphone, which was carbon. These were really popular. It was popular in the teens. And so you would have this connected to your radio, you had your own radio at home and you could broadcast at home. So these were really popular.

But in noisy environments this was a problem because it’s just omni. It just catches everything. There’s nothing to keep it from capturing everything. So Jensen at Magnavox created this thing. It’s the same type of handheld microphone, but it just added this very simple thing on the side, just little holes. And so this with those holes on the side became much more directional and would reject the sides. This is the first directional microphone. And you could call it cardioid because of those holes.

So those holes — that’s essentially the predecessor to what we have today in things like an SM7 or an RE20 or similar dynamic mics? Yes. You’ll see on the side of dynamic mics that there’s venting. Even if I move this SM57 over and show you there’s some kind of venting on the sides here, just enough to make it directional. And shotgun mics will have these vents all the way down the side to reject anything but the very front. So it started with this type of technology.

How many microphones did you research for the book and how did you structure your research? Well, we started by creating a repository of all the mics in the collection, and luckily we got the collection in 2019, in December, and it was the spring that the pandemic hit. So we had a lot of time at home. There’s a lot of unpacking of boxes and a lot of reading and a lot of researching.

And so that became the time when we really laid it out in a repository — we would scan the documents, we would keep pictures. Bob’s collection is so vast that it really took a long time to organize it. And then choosing the worthy microphones was another challenge, because honestly, there’s 3,500 mics. So which are the best, you know, which ones do you want to put in a book? You can’t put them all in a book.

So we went through and chose the high fliers, the ones that you would expect to see in a book. Plus the historic mics, the ones that really demonstrated the change in technology or new technologies. And then there were the goofball mics that everybody knows — the SM57, SM58, the 420s and the goofy little square mics that came with the tape recorders. We’ve got those too. And so yeah, we tried to have a few galleries with selections of different mics, but a lot of attention is paid to American mics.

The ribbons from RCA, the development of the condensers and the people who were doing that at Westinghouse and Western Electric and those early designs, the early RCA designs. Actually, one of the condensers went to the South Pole with Admiral Byrd, and these broadcasts were being made from the South Pole. This was really historic stuff. And we’ve got the mic in the collection from that, and it’s in photos and stuff. We have historic photos. Wow. It’s just, you know, I’ve been recording for a long time and I’m excited about music and the equipment that’s used for recording. But there’s something about the microphones that seem to be like the jewels of the studio.

You know, they’re like precious pearls, each one of them. They each have their own character and you want to collect them all. They’re like seashells almost. So I hope that when you look through the book, you catch that kind of fascination for microphones, the designs over the years.

Did you notice any trends in designs, and were there designs that were just decorative rather than functional? You could think that in the 50s there was a lot of microphones that had character, like they looked like spaceships, streamlined. They looked like car grills. The art deco cast chrome years are really fun and not necessarily functional. Some of those cases, actually, would sound much better if they didn’t have this big hollow funny case around them.

You know, I always thought the Shure 55 was one of those that would sound better if it was in a smaller case, probably. I can hear it when someone sings into it, it sounds a little hollow because of the case. So yeah, not all of it was functional or practical.

There were a few microphones in the development of microphones that were kind of dangerous. There’s a mic called the Glow Discharge that would — it’s this thing that would have like two electrodes and the plasma that would go between the electrodes. That was your diaphragm. So you had to speak into this crazy electric thing. Anyway, it’s so dangerous that they had to stop using it, but they used it in radio for a little while. This was 1927, 28. Yeah, it was very early.

I want to ask you about some specific microphones. On page 116 I think it is, in 1937, it’s a shotgun mic. And it’s got such an unusual look to it. Yeah I know the mic. It’s a Western Electric and I’ll bring it over here. Yeah. This thing is crazy because it’s a bundle of tubes. And each tube is tuned to a frequency for capturing sound. Isn’t that crazy? But this was the first design for a shotgun mic. I don’t think this was as successful as as later models.

And obviously there’s some classics in there that we all know, the Western Electric Birdcage. Some of these other ones have such a — the tadpole mics, strange shape to them and very art deco. Yeah. And they were made of Bakelite, which was a kind of a new material for mic making at the time. So it was very trendy.

And then there’s the transitional amplifiers built by AIC. Like, it shows the whole transition between these bigger bigger tubes and then the smaller and smaller. And the 1947 Astatic 600S. That’s such a weird one. I know which one. It looks like a little spaceship. Right. It looks like something out of The Jetsons. The funny thing is it was a crystal mic made out of piezoelectric crystal, and they would not work so good. They were affected by humidity a lot. Or if you dropped it, it would break. It was very sensitive. But yeah. Not the best mics but sure do look good. They’re great to put up on a shelf.

And the Shure 710, the Chic-Let. I think that nowadays we see a lot of mic companies diversifying by showing us different color mics. And you’d think, oh, okay, that’s a new thing. But that’s actually quite an old concept, as evidenced by the Chic-Let with all their different colors that they would offer. Oh yeah. And as a collector today, every time you find one of these little Chic-Lets, it’s really fun because they pop up in thrift stores all the time. And if you get one that works, boy, they sound great for harmonica and stuff for that kind of harp sound. They’re actually useful in the studio.

Do you have a favorite out of all these mics or like a handful of favorites that aren’t the traditional mics that we’re all used to in the studio? A recent discovery for me are the Pearl mics. They’re made in Sweden and they’re just gorgeous. They’re in the book too, there’s a page about the Pearl mics. But that’s a recent discovery. And there’s so many. Oh can I show you another one. I don’t even think this one is in the book. It’s not even in the book, but it’s just so awesome.

Okay. This is the coolest mic. I don’t think this is in the book. It’s a 6102 type 6102ft. Look at this. Isn’t that crazy? Wow. I think this might be my favorite. And it’s not in the book, but it’ll get in the next book. This is the 6102 RFP.

Now, did you go through and listen to every single mic? No. Oh, mainly because in particular the condensers, to heat them up and to get the power right, I’m going to have to actually do some studying before I do any of that. So I haven’t done it much with the condensers. But the ribbons I’ve used quite a bit. Some of these mics are exceptional for vocals, especially female vocal. I use the Q3C, which might be my favorite vocal mic for female vocal. It’s a ribbon, an old ribbon from the 50s. It’s fantastic.

Over time, have you seen in the development of the mics or the shift in mics, the connectors? Did the connectors change greatly over time? Seems like for each country they all have their own kind of protocol for that. There’s always been strange connectors in all of this.

Is the book officially out yet or when does it come out? Well, the book is coming out on November the 12th of this year, and I’m getting ready now. We’ve got our review copies in, so I’m preparing some review copies to send out. I’m preparing one for you right now. You are? Can I show you what’s in the pack? It’s really great. So you get the book right, and then you get a bandana. Look at this special microphone bandana with all microphones. It’s got the microphones on it for the Great Vintage Microphone Book. There’s all this stuff. Oh. But this is the best. You’re gonna love this.

I’ve been known to grow microphones in my garden. So I wanted to share my secrets for microphone growing. So I have included three sets of Sylvia’s microphone seeds. We have the ribbons, and we have the dynamics here. Well, now to see it here, there’s the dynamics and the condensers. And the thing is, they’re little seeds, right. So there you got the little microphone seeds. That’s hilarious. And you did all the artwork obviously. Yes I did the artwork. Yeah. Wow. It’s going to be fun sending these out. We’ll send out your pack this week. I hope you like it. Oh I can’t wait and I can’t wait to share it with everybody out there.

So can people — will they be able to preorder? People can preorder now and then November the 12th, they’ll start shipping. So just in time for Christmas. So you and Chris can give us a link that we can put in the show notes for this episode that they can preorder. Yes, yes. Yeah. It’s available everywhere.

I love that. I mean, you’re such a beacon in our recording community, and I love that you put this book together for all of us to enjoy and learn about. Sometimes, you know, I think we forget that, you know, we love recording. We love making records. But when one of our peers makes such great educational material — and not only is it entertaining, but it’s also educational. I just I really love to embrace that and share that with people. So I’m glad that you all did this.

I’m glad that — better you than me, because I think I would have been like, oh, I don’t know if I can make it through this, but the fact that you got through that many mics, I mean, I know you didn’t put all the mics in, but I mean, 600 mics, right? Yeah, it’s a good book and it’s information I think that needs to be kept. And it could be lost and it shouldn’t be lost. I mean, this is American history. It’s really an American story. Very special. But the whole world embraced the microphone. And history has changed over and over again because of the microphone and directly because of microphones.

I mean, can you imagine just the politicians and yeah, music and oh yeah. So important. Communication in general. Communication. Yeah. Easily one of the most important inventions in the history of the world. Yeah. And you know, back to this little wooden microphone. David Edward Hughes did not patent this. He gave it away freely to the world. And then I think Edison came in and tried to steal it or something afterwards. But yeah. It’s an important tool for the world actually.

Well for you audience, you know I’ll obviously include the link in the show notes for you to buy your copy. And I can’t wait to see the book in the physical. And huge congratulations to you and Chris on this book. What an achievement. Well thanks Matt, it’s great seeing you again. And congratulations on all your success. Oh well, thank you. And to you as well. Thank you. All right. Sylvia, will you take care? Okay. And thanks again. All right. Bye bye.