Notes and Comments

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 48, 14 June 1929, Page 26

Notes and Comments

By

SWITCH

CHRISTCHURCH visitor, who has been doing a good deal ‘of listeningin in Wellington, informed "Switch" that the capital city is remarkably clear of local electrical leakages; but. Christchurch has-rather more than its share. 2YA, Wellington, is now being heard with good volume in the southern city, and multivalve set owners derive a considerable amount of entertainment from the Wellington station.

R. Laurence Haibert, announcer at 2FC, Sydney, one of the most cor-rectly-speaking announcer in Australia, says :--"If the announcer does trip-and he often does-over a word, what happens? By the following mail comes a badly ‘punctuated, and, as a rule, ungrammatical, letter from: an irate old gentleman, whose ear has been offended by the said mistake. Remember, he may make a mistake himself when making up his cash book, and possibly a very

silly one, like a simple addition; but a few minutes’ work, a deft rub of the eraser, and no.one is any the wiser. But when the announcer makes a mistake the whole world knows it; it has gone, and no power on earth can recall it-it’s rather terrifying in its potentialities.’ Perhaps some of our New Zealand critics will give thought to this remark.

HW Zealand home-constructors have good reason to be pleased that the Japanese radio. regulations are not in operation in the Dominion. A Japanese experimenter, before he begins to build his set has. to place his credentials before the Chief of the Bureau of Communications, and receive a permit. ‘When he has built his set it has to receive the seal of the authorities before he is permitted to use it. He is not permitted to alter his set without official sanction, under risk of a heavy penalty.

A SHORTWAVE beginner mentioned to the writer recently that reception game in "gusts," and he was anxious to’ know whether this was due to a faulty valve or battery. The gustiness he referred to is characteristic of a good deal of shortwave reception, and is merely accelerated fading. It is one of the disappointing features of short-wave reception. Those who do not operate a short-wave set may have observed this gustiness when short-wave rebroadecasts are heard from 2YA, Wellington, and they have sometimes erroneously attributed it to local rouble,

ME: Robert Allen, of the Samoa Public Trust Office, Apia, reports: "An interesting point in reception here is that by putting in a broad tuning aerial coil and tuning midway between 2FC and 2YA, Wellington, I am able to hear the post office clocks at Sydney, Wellington, and Apia. chiming 8, 9.80 and 10 respectively and simultaneously." A WELLINGTON listener, who counts himself merely an average person, with the average amount of musical appréciation, urges "Switch" to draw the attention of banjoists and of other instrumentalists: who: specialise in one_instrument that they have available a wide scope of musie suitable to their individual type of insteument without, straying into realms unsuitable for their particular line. "The banjo has its limitations and it is. showing ‘up. these limitations to ask it to reproduce certain music," he concluded.

[HE above criticism was shown to & ‘local musician of ability and experience, He coneurred with the protest. After consideration he gave the faflowing to "Switch" as his studied opinion :- "The eternal fitness of things is: &lways paramount in the mind of the true artist, whether’ in music, painting, drawing, sculpture, or even architecture. Yet this breach of judgment on the part of instrumentalists is all ‘too frequent. Let me quote an example. Not so long ago I heard a mandolin duo attempt to play the ‘Miserere’? duet from ‘Il Trovatore.’ The result was an utter travesty. There is an abundance of delightful musi¢ particularly suitable for the mandolin without trenching on grand opera. It is a wonder that someone has not yet attempted to play excerpts from ‘Norma’ on the bagpipes."

AN American visitor to Wellington who modestly admits some knowledge of banjo playing, while as-a matter of fact he is an exceptionally good performer, was asked by "Switch" as to his opinion upon the playing of a hymn on the banjo. He said that the banjo owed its origin

to the negro slaves in the Southern States of America, and was first, extensively used for devotional music or, as it is now known, as "spiritual" song, but this was vastly different to the hymn heard on a banjo over the air recently. The negroes also played a certain type of dance musie and "nigger" songs of a most distinctive kind.

OME theatrical peéople still retain the notion that radio is a rival and not an ally. to the stage. Mr. Howard Milholland, manager of KGO, Oakland, California, asserts that radio is a wonderful aid to both the theatrical and the concert stages. He points out that entertainment. seen and heard in the company of a large number of people heightens emotional reaction, and so we will always have theatre audiences ‘and ¢oncert audiences. Radio serves to advertise the stage, and to whet the appetite of listeners for more than what is actually put on. the air.

OFC, Sydney, announced a new idea recently in a "slumber music" session. It was introduced at the end of a Sunday evening session. The items comptised gramophone records specially selected with music of a restful character. No items were announced, each record following the other without intermission. The idea wag tried out as an experiment, and its continuance will depend upon opinions sént by listeners. ,

OXE may doubt the sincerity of a few _ listeners who have written to the Wellington Radio Society stating they decline to join that body, as it had attempted to stop the re-laying of football matches on Saturday afternoons. If those self-same listeners had attended the Radio ‘Society’s annual meeting that exceedingly ill-advised motion would not have been carried. As it was, the older and more experienced members of the society. voted against the motion, which had as one of its sponsors a listener who had only just joined the union.

ILM actors and actresses in their anxiety to learn if they had the same appeal in their voices that they have in their. shadow personalities, have been making secret visits to KGO, Oakland, California, the home of the radio drama in the west. Several of the stats temporarily joined the ranks of "KGO Players," believing that in the radio drama they have a great medium to train their voices for the talkies. Assumed names were. used so as to obtain an unbiased reaction to their work, and to avoid contract entangléments.

A CITY listener who lately visited’ Mastertoa was artounded at the exce’lence of reception in that town during broad daylight. All the YA — stations were available from the loudspeaker early in the afternoon. 8YA Christchurch came in with such volume as to be intolerable, and had to be toned down. A Wellington radio technician informed "Switch" that his sets increased in volume 100 per cent. in reception of long ‘distance stations when transferred from the city to up-country.

AN interesting experiment recently took place in Moscow, when a shortwave telephony transmitter was taken up by an engineer in an ordinary gas balloon. Commnication with the earth was easily established, even at heights exceed. ing 4000 metres (18,000 feet), Two-way -eommunication was maintained continuously for two days and two nights on a wavelength of 43 meétres, the transmissions being simultaneously picked up by Odessa, Vladivostok, Minsk, and Leningr. . .

RRYEN if your loudspeaker or headphones show no .signs.of damage from a fall, the concussion weakens the strength of the magnets within each. Listeners should take care not -to bump, jar, or drop either a loudspeaker or a pair of headphones. Thete is a method of restoring ‘weakened magnets, but it involves some mechanical skill in remoying magnets from loudspeakers or -headphones.

R. R. O'DEA (Whangamomona, : Taranaki), writes "Switch" :- "The enclosed paragraph, clipped from the New York ‘Nation,’ of Februar} ¥, 1929, may be of some use. for -pu ‘Notes and Comments. I always ‘enjoy reading your néwsy pats. and have icked up many valuable hints thererom. ‘Radioing to a man 18,000 miles away to get him to radio 13,000 miles back to a man at close hand in order to get the latter to hang up his telephone-receiver-this is the extraordinary happening reported by Commander Byrd in a recent dispatch to the New York "Times." The "Times," it appears, found difficulty in -receiving the -wireless messages from Byrd which are sent by hit every night from his. position in the Antarctic ice, because of the peculiar conditions , around’ its pbuilding in, New York City. The employée . recéiving these messages found tha’ he could get: them quite clearly in .his home .in Astoria across the Hast River from Manhattan, so clearly that by placing his telephone receiver close to his radio receiving instrument the Byrd dots andy. dashes could be heard perfectly in the "Times’s" office. One night, however, | the’ "Times" wished to call its employee in Astoria. There was only one way to do it. The newspaper radioed to that .one of Byrd’s ships which was receiving, and asked it to telephone over the ice to the other ship ‘to tell the employee in Astoria to hang up his receiver. Two minutes later the man in question rang up saying: "Byrd says you want to talk to me’! Thus is space annihilated. Who could have .conceived a few years ago that one might send radiq méssages 26,000 miles in two minutes to ask o man only about three miles away ‘to hang up his telephone recéiver?’ "

HEN aerial insulators are being cleaned, sandsoap, pumice or other abrasive substance should not be used for the purpose, as it tends to remove the glaze from the sutface of the insulators. The glazed surface breaks rain up into drops and thus prevénts a continuous ‘wet surface being ‘formed, which would causé-a leakage across the insulators,

D° any of our New Zealand radio..’ "aunts" want to adopt a nice wellgrown boy? "I Hke you as an aunt, but I’d like you béttér still as a mother," wrote a 17-year-old Filipino boy from Manila recently to Aunt Betty (Ruth Thompson), of. KGO, Oakland, California, "Tf you will send ime third class fare I'll go to the United Statés, get a job, and bé your son." And he enclosed his. picture. N ex-British Navy and Army: man, Captain J. H. Watson, of Sydney, who is over eighty years of age, and rather guiltily admits-to being the culprit who first introducéd rabbits to Australia, is to be personally interviewed before the mic- 7 rophone of 2BL, Sydney, on the evening of May 30. Listeners in New Zealand will be interested in the idea, and no doubt a good few sets will be tuned in to SB to hear the interview.