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History of multitrack recording


Multitrack recording of sound is the process in which sound and other electro-acoustic signals are captured on a recording medium such as magnetic tape, which is divided into two or more audio tracks that run parallel with each other. Because they are carried on the same medium, the tracks stay in perfect synchronisation, while allowing multiple sound sources to be recorded asynchronously. The first system for creating stereophonic sound (using telephone technology) was demonstrated by Clément Ader in Paris in 1881. The pallophotophone, invented by Charles A. Hoxie and first demonstrated in 1922, recorded optically on 35 mm film, and some versions used a format of as many as twelve tracks in parallel on each strip. The tracks were recorded one at a time in separate passes and were not intended for later mixdown or stereophony; as with later half-track and quarter-track monophonic tape recording, the multiple tracks simply multiplied the maximum recording time possible, greatly reducing cost and bulk. British EMI engineer Alan Blumlein patented systems for recording stereophonic sound and surround sound on disc and film in 1933. The history of modern multitrack audio recording using magnetic tape began in 1943 with the invention of stereo tape recording, which divided the recording head into two tracks.

The next major development in multitrack recording came in 1953, when musician Les Paul devised the concept of 8-track recording; this was commercially developed by the Ampex corporation, which launched its first "Sel-Sync" (Selective Synchronous) recording system in 1955, but for the next 35 years, multitrack audio recording technology was largely confined to specialist radio, TV and music recording studios, primarily because multitrack tape machines were both very large and very expensive - the first Ampex 8-track recorder, installed in Les Paul's home studio in 1957, cost a princely US$10,000 - roughly three times the US average yearly income in 1957, and equivalent to around $90,000 in 2016. However, this situation changed radically in 1979 with the introduction of the TASCAM Portastudio, which used the inexpensive compact audio cassette as the recording medium, making good-quality 4-track (and later 8-track) multitrack recording available to the average consumer for the first time. Ironically, by the time the Portastudio had become popular, electronics companies were already introducing digital audio recording systems, and by the 1990s, computer-based digital multitrack recording systems such as Pro Tools and Cubase were being adopted by the recording industry, and soon became standard. By the early 2000s, rapid advances in home computing and digital audio software were making digital multitrack audio recording systems available to the average consumer, and high-quality digital multitrack recording systems like GarageBand were being included as a standard feature on home computers.


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