Oregon
Ralph Towner- guitar
Paul McCandless- woodwinds
Glen Moore- bass
Colin Wolcott- percussion
the Free Music Store
(I am fairly sure this is the one in
Troy, N.Y. U.S.A. but can't be certain of that.)
date: February 9, 1972
source: 1st generation FM broadcast over WBAI, N.Y. FM radio
runtime: 117:09 minutes (2 CD's)
performance quality: A-
recording quality: A/A- (2 sources)
lineage: reel tape >
(presumably a master recorded over FM, this the 1st 90 minutes +/-)
my cassette (Maxell XLII-S, no dolby used for whole show) >
soundforge 4.5 > FLAC > torrent.
The last 30 min. part of this is probably 2nd gen. and from a cassette.
It doesn't sound "generated", but the reception doesn't sound quite
as clear throughout. Most of this part sounds almost as good as the rest.
comments:
This is the earliest Oregon in concert recording I've ever heard
and knowing how many people love this group I thought this would be of
interest. I think it is the whole show, a rebroadcast, apparently from
the "Free Music Store archives" over WBAI radio, which I think is a
college station in Syracuse, the northern part of N.Y. state. The 1st
90 min. + of this comes from a reel, don't know if a master reel or not
but it sounds nice and clean, very important especially for an Oregon
recording since much of the music has many subtleties to it that may
be lost entirely in a hissy or noisy recording. I have a few Oregon
recordings and am only sharing the cleanest ones, for now, this FM,
a couple of soundboards (1 1st gen. from 1975, 1 master from 95 w/trio),
and an aud I made in 1986. All of these should be clean enough even for
the discerning Oregon listener. The last 35 min. or so comes from a
slightly inferior (but still quite enjoyable, also FM) alternate source,
the reel copy only had 1 full side and ran out. I don't know any of these
titles at all, they may not have known half of them either since they
were still a very new group at this time, thus for any fan of Oregon
who hasn't heard this or anything this early in their careers, you will
want to hear this, and hear that even that long ago, Oregon already
had a very distinct style of music and had become very good at it. It's
noteworthy that this show has some fairly Oregon- typical extended songs
and also several much shorter than usual songs for them. So if you look
at the number of tracks before anything else about this show and think
holy * this must be a 4 hour concert, not quite, more like 2 which is
alot for a group that had only been together for a year or two.
There is a radio ID track (#8) about halfway through the show which
might make a good disc 2 opener and/or disc 1 closer track, but that's
entirely up to you. You may want to open some Granola or Trail Mix
when you listen to this, but that's up to you too. Enjoy it. glasnostrd19