MS Subbulakshmi: Mela-Raga-Malika-Chakra [HTCS 03B 3346] a cassette recorded and released in India in 1989

Here is a lovely Carnatic vocal cassette featuring Madurai Shanmukhavadivu Subbulakshmi (16 September 1916 – 11 December 2004) singing a composition by Maha Vaidyanatha Sivan (1844-93) which incorporates all 72 ragas in the Carnatic system, as explained in the liner notes.

It may have occurred to some of my readers that almost all of the Carnatic music on this blog is from cassette. That's because Indian-made LPs of Carnatic music are extremely rare. Online dealers and websites selling Indian music are predominantly selling Hindustani music. Several years ago I purchased several big boxes of cassettes from Shrimatis in Berkeley, CA before they closed their doors and these are what I have been posting. Records from western labels such as World Pacific and Oriental are easier to obtain. 

Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, extensively refurbished and rebuilt to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann

Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones

downloads:

24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (1.3 GB)

highest resolution files I am capable of producing

16bit, 44.kHz FLAC files (361 MB)

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR

320 kbps mp3 files (134 MB)

highest quality mp3 files possible 

TR Mahalingam: Carnatic Instrumental [HTC 8090] a cassette recorded in 1971 and manufactured in 1990 in India

TR "Mali" Mahalingam is no stranger to this blog. This will be the fourth album which I have shared so far by this fantastic carnatic flutist.

Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, refurbished to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones

downloads:

24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (903 MB)
highest resolution files I am capable of producing

16bit, 44.kHz FLAC files (239 MB)

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR

320 kbps mp3 files (95 MB)

highest quality mp3 files possible 

video of a concert by "mali" in Chennai in 1971 (audio only):

Lalgudi Jayaraman, N Ramani, and R Venkatraman: Violin - Venu - Veena [HTCS 03B 8080] a cassette originally recorded in 1967 and manufactured in 1990 in India

Here is an interesting carnatic violin, flute (venu) and veena album which was very popular in its day. It has been reissued in multiple iterations and many people have very warm feelings about this album.

About 8 years ago it appeared as a vinyl transfer here.  It is mentioned in this article which is a brief introduction to carnatic music.

Violin: Lalgudi Jayaraman
Venu: N Ramani
Veena: R Venkatraman


Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, refurbished to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones

downloads:

24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (892 MB)

highest resolution files I am capable of producing - large file!

16bit, 44.kHz FLAC files (240 MB)

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR

320 kbps mp3 files (95 MB)

highest quality mp3 files possible 

Here is a concert by N Ramani:

Lalith Rao: A Never Ending Journey [Rhythm House 240 366] a cassette recorded and released in India in 1987

Here we have another post featuring the delightful vocals of Lalith Rao, a prominent female exponent of the Agra gharana.

Click here to see past uploads of Rao.

The titles and performers can clearly be seen on the scans below, so I thought repeating this information would be unnecessary.

One interesting feature about those cassettes from Rhythm House which I have seen are that they have been manufactured using a process where the cassette tape master is played in real time (sometimes cassettes are sped up 8x or more to speed up the process -- adjustments in EQ have to be made for this and the quality is almost never as good as a "real time duplicated" cassette).

Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, refurbished to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann

Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones

downloads:

24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (1.2 GB)

highest resolution files I am capable of producing - large file!

16bit, 44.kHz FLAC files (298 MB)

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR

320 kbps mp3 files (134 MB)

highest quality mp3 files possible 

Click here for a good explanation of what FLAC files are and why you should be listening to them if you can.

Chitti Babu: Carnatic Veena [HTC 8155] a cassette originally recorded in 1968 and manufactured in 1990 in India

Here is a very nice cassette of music by Chitti Babu, the well-known veena performer. I decided to transfer this cassette after the previous upload purely because they share the same Ghatam player.

Chitti Babu was the disciple of ES Shastry, whose work has appeared on this blog in the past.

I was at a veena festival in the US once and met Chitti Babu's eldest son, who was very kind to talk to me briefly. He was cheerful and friendly and I was a little sad that I couldn't spend more time chatting with him.

Tracklist
A1 Chalamela (Varnam)
Composed By – Kuppuswami Iyer

Raga: Natakuranji
Tala: Adi

A2 Sudhamayi
Composed By – Muthayya Bhagavathar

Raga: Amritavarshini
Tala: Rupakam

A3 Kshierasagara Sayana
Composed By – Thyagaraja* 

Raga: Devagandhari
Tala: Adi

B1 Ragam-Tanam-Pallavi 

Raga: Charukesi

B2 Apadooraku (Javali)
Composed By – Pattabhiramayya* 

Raga: Khamas
Tala: Madhyadi

B3 Nallanivada-Misra 

B4 Mangalam (A Hymn from Vedas)


Veena – Chitti Babu

Ghatam – Alangudi Ramachandran
Mridangam – Vellore Ramabadhran 

Notes
Original printed catalog number on the cover spine is STC038 56884. A small piece of paper has been pasted over it with catalog number HTC 8155.


Transfer: Nakamichi ZX-9 cassette deck, refurbished to "better than new" state by Willi Hermann
Pre-amplification: Vintage refurbished Pioneer SX-780.
Recorder: Sony PCM-M10 at 24bit/96kHz resolution
Software: Audacity and xAct.
Monitoring: Focal Spirit One headphones

downloads:

24bit, 96kHz FLAC files (935 MB)
highest resolution files I am capable of producing

16bit, 44.kHz FLAC files (248 MB)

after decoding to WAV files, these can be burned to CDR

320 kbps mp3 files (100 MB)

highest quality mp3 files possible