Record Shortage

Record collectors were last week beginning to find many of the most desirable disks harder & harder to get. Many albums of the highest musical value had disappeared entirely from the market. The reason for the shortage was not James Caesar Petrillo's recording ban (TIME, June 22, 1942). It was a combination of wartime circumstances hitting the recording industry a mighty wallop.

Last year U.S. record manufacturers reached an alltime production record with 136,000,000 disks. This year production is down at least 50%.

Most important factors are: 1) a shortage of skilled manpower, as in most U.S. industries; 2) government rationing of shellac (which comes from India) at 20% of prewar needs; 3) wear & tear on nonreplaceable machinery; 4) lack of adequate transportation and packing facilities.

In the face of these shortages, U.S. record buyers, with more money to spend, and a war-heightened interest in the solace of great music, were placing orders at about three times their 1942 rate.

Repressing Repressed. Most U.S. record manufacturers denied cutting their catalogues. But record buyers found that only about half the titles listed were available. Factories had started rationing production on the basis of orders already received. Unfortunately this meant that scores of the very finest (but less popular) records were not being repressed.

The influence of Boss Petrillo's ban was limited to the popular field, where the biggest producer, Decca, had already signed with the union. Capitalizing on its capitulation, Decca last week put out a bang-up album of all the songs from the Broadway smash Oklahoma!, sung by the original cast. Other records of the month:

Metropolitan Revivals (Enrico Caruso. Luisa Tetrazzini, Marcella Sembrich. Antonio Scotti, Geraldine Farrar, Marcel Journet, Louise Homer and others; Victor; 8 sides). Despite their mechanical and tonal obsolescence, Victor's oldtime recordings prove that the Golden Age voices were as beautiful as oldtimers claim.

Mendelssohn: "Italian" Symphony (New York Philharmonic-Symphony, Sir Thomas Beecham conducting; Columbia; 8 sides). A superb, warm performance, ranking with Koussevitzky's shimmering Victor version.

Beethoven: Quartet in F Major, Op. 59, No.1 (Busch Quartet; Columbia; 11 sides). Somewhat rough-edged performance of a knotty classic, well recorded.

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