Stereophonic "Lady and the Tramp" tracks?

[shicorp]

I just wondered, if anybody else noticed this.

I re-listened to my "Lady and the Tramp" album and noticed, that there aren't any stereo tracks on the album, although Randy Thornton's producer's notes say:
"Though the entire production was a monophonic recording, these separated elements allowed me to create a stereo effect on three of the songs: "The Siamese Cat Song," in which I was able to separate the cats; the chorus in "Bella Notte," for which we had two lead vocal tracks, one music track, and two background chorus tracks; and the "Finale," which had five vocal tracks and one music track."
Maybe this is just a mistake of the pressing I own, Edel 0103342DNY. Can anybody report, wether American pressings also do not have the mentioned stereo tracks?

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Gurgitoy2]

The American "Classic Soundtrack Series" version does have the stereo tracks mentioned. It's subtle, but noticeable. I'm not sure about the later budget re-issue, but I would assume it's the same as the CSS disc. I wonder why the European release was not released with those tracks, with liner notes that says it does?

 

[merlinjones]

even more strangely, there are true stereo music elements for Lady - - I have heard them - - why they weren't used for the CD was a matter of debate amongst the film restoration types who knew of their existence...

 

[Technirama70]

being a BIG fan of the TCM/Warner/Rhino CD releases of MGM - Warner Bros. - RKO musicals on cds, I have noticed that they are able to make 'stereo' recordings of mono films soundtracks by using the 'music stems' and separating them on the left & right channels on the cds for a 'quasi-stereo' effect. So why can't Disney do the same. Mono sound is great and all, but most of the "classic soundtrack" cds movie dvd counterparts have been released in 5.1 stereo, so how hard could it be to give us some sort of "stereo" cd re-release?

 

[shicorp]

First of all, I would like to thank for all those helpful replies!

Concerning mono to stereo upmixes:

As you may know, M-G-M has been recording using multiple microphones through the scoring stage. The signal picked up from these microphones has been recorded on several optical tracks -- therefore these are true stereo recordings!
Disney, as I know, has been using a similar recording system, but it seems, if all "stems" for these recordings have been lost, although some of the movie tracks are in true stereo.
In fact, this is the case for many M-G-M issues too. The recent FSM issue of "Julius Caesar" is in mono (with some reverb to enhance the fidelity?), but the actual movie track is in stereo. So, the only possibility to get a true stereo mix, is to go back to the movie mix itself with all dialogues and sound effects. A similar thing happened to Metro's "Belle Of New York".
I have to say, that I really do not like upmixes from mono soundtracks. I recently received the new "Sleeping Beauty" DVD and they did a 5.1 upmix of the original German mono master and this sounded like they all were singing into cans. "Pinocchio" suffered a smiliar problem.

By the way, has anybody yet noticed, that "Bambi" is coming on DVD next February?

 

[Technirama70]

When I was referring to the MGM/Rhino CDs, their use of the music stems, while giving a "stereo" effect pretty much opens up the mono sound to a wider listening field. They are not like the "simulated stereo" LPs from the 70s where they electronically created a stereo effect, I find they are more pleasing to the ear.

From what I understand, Disney pretty much saved a lot of the film elements from their past productions, so the music stems should still be intact. That is what Randy used for the Siamese Cat song from Lady and the Tramp for the CD.

 

[merlinjones]

In the case of Lady, limited engagements were in stereo on original release - - I believe there is an entire true stereo mix track in existence.