Hellmuth Kolbe (28 August 1926, in Switzerland – 15 July 2002, in Zurich, Switzerland) was a musician and an audio recording and acoustics pioneer.
Early life Kolbe was the son of Walter Karl Kolbe, an Austrian lawyer and Editha Berta Ehrbar of Vienna who was related to the Austrian piano manufacturer Friedrich Ehrbar (1827–1905). Kolbe's parents separated when he was five years old and Kolbe and his mother then moved to Zug, Switzerland, where she remarried.Leonhard H. Personal communication. 15 November 2012, Zürich, Switzerland. Between 1933 and 1945, Kolbe completed 12 years of schooling. He learnt to play the piano, double-bass and vibraphone. For a season in 1945, Kolbe was a pianist at a hotel in Engelberg and during the day, worked as a ski instructor. He became fluent in English, French, and German and later, Spanish and Italian.Brown J. et al In Memoriam Journal of the Audio Engineering Society December 2002 Vol 50(12) p1121 f.
Education In 1946, Kolbe studied music, musicology and orchestral conducting in Vienna and received his diploma in 1953. He then enrolled at the Vienna Academy of Music and Performing Arts (now called the Vienna University of Music and Performing Arts).Kolbe U. Personal communication. 30 October 2012, Wallisellen, Switzerland. Kolbe studied with Hans Erich Apostel (1901–1972), head of the Austrian section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (ISCM) from 1946 to 1948.Hans Erich Apostel Classical Composers Database 8 June 2010Apostel. Schoenberglaw.com
Career From 1947 to 1950, Kolbe was an editor of Universal Edition. He revised scores such as Alban Berg's Wozzeck and Lulu. Kolbe also played with Hot Club Seven, an Austrian band, where he was known to the audience as Hello Kolbe. Fatty George (Franz Georg Pressler) (1927–1982) was another member of this band.Kolbe H. Letter to an unidentified colleague “Franzi” in Germany, sent from Vienna, 20 April 1950.Fatty George – Jazzmus – Die Grünen SeniorInnen Seniorinnen.gruene.at The Hot Club Seven played for United States military forces and in Soviet Army officer casinos in Austria.
In 1950, Kolbe gave lectures titled Introduction to Jazz Music at the Österreichische Radio-Verkehrs-Aktiengesellschaft (Austrian radio transmission company (RAVAG),RAVAG Aeiou.at 31 July 2001. and had his own jazz program each week on Thursday and Friday nights at the RAVAG radio station, Wien I. He led jazz combos and wrote jazz critiques.
Rot-Weiss-Rot In 1947, Kolbe approached American Armed Forces Radio, and in 1948 was employed as a producer and engineer for the US forces radio station, Rot-Weiss-Rot (RWR), Vienna.Nelson T. Kolbe. Studio Sound magazine, UK, August 1987, p32.Emmenegger U. Grosse Töne aus einem kleinen Dorf (Big sound from a small village). Zürcher Oberland Medien AG, 23 December 1972. Soon afterwards, the station seconded Kolbe to the Wiener Musikverein to record the performances of orchestras such as the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra and the Vienna Symphony. In 1987, Kolbe said, “We were two Americans, two Swiss and seventeen Austrians and we were heard all over Europe. My department was jazz and modern classical, together with being involved in the design of the studios. We also did a lot of live concerts including one a week from the large concert hall in Vienna, where we used just one microphone, a Shure modified with an AKG capsule and it sounded wonderful!"
Mastertone
From 1951 to 1963 in Vienna, Kolbe operated "Mastertone", his first recording studio. The Mastertone studio was engaged by Vox and Vanguard. Kolbe said, "At that time, the rate of exchange of the dollar to the Austrian Schilling was very favorable and American record companies soon found it well worthwhile to record in Vienna".
In 1987, Kolbe said, "In the autumn of 1953 [we got] the first stereo tape recorder in Europe, an Ampex 350... which meant we aimed for proper stereo image rather than the 'ping-pong' style that was popular in the early days – everything on the left or the right and no middle".Phantom vintage recording 1955 Allied catalog. Reel2reeltexas.com From the beginning, Kolbe was a strong advocator of 3-channel stereo.
In 1956, Kolbe worked with Karlheinz Stockhausen, a composer of electronic music.Together they developed the first electronic music scores in the form of frequency versus time graphs. In 1965, they recorded Stockhausen’s Klavierstücke I-XI (1961) and Mikrophonie I/II (1965). Kolbe engineered both.Hellmuth Kolbe Discography Discogs.
CBS Masterworks
From 1955 to 1975, Kolbe worked as a freelance recording engineer and producer for Columbia International (CBS Masterworks).Columbia Goes Deeper O'Seas. Billboard Magazine 9 November 1963, p. 4 Accessed at Google Books 23 September 2015. He was employed to record all their classical collections in Europe, often uncredited. This work involved extensive travelling to record on location. For example, in April 1966, Kolbe recorded Mahler's 8th symphony with Leonard Bernstein and the London Symphony Orchestra in 3-track stereo in London and was nominated for a "best engineered recording – classical".Mahler Symphonies – Bernstein Classical Reviews Music Web UK July 2001. Also in 1966, Kolbe went to Paris to record Alban Berg's "Wozzeck" with the conductor Pierre Boulez and the "Orchestre et Chœrs de L'Opera", Paris. For this, Kolbe received the Grand prix du disque, an "Académie Charles Cros Diplome".Académie Charles Cros. Charlescros. In early June 1967, just after the Six-Day War, Kolbe was in Israel. In the mid1960s, Kolbe researched quadraphonic recording systems with Benjamin B. Bauer for CBS' “Stereo Quadraphonic” (SQ) matrix system. In 1970, Kolbe accompanied the organist, Edward Biggs across Checkpoint Charlie to Leipzig, East Germany to record Bach's works in the Thomaskirche for CBS.Whitney C. All the Stops:The Glorious pipe organ and its American Masters. PublicAffairs, 2004. , 9780786740253 p. 179
Phonag record company
In 1957, Kolbe returned to Switzerland and in 1960 he founded the Phonag Record Company in Winterthur, with the label Helvetia.Lamy A. personal communication. Hotel Rössli, Lindau-ZHMCI 16 track desk. Der Landbote 6 June 1975. The company mainly produced Swiss folklore records. In Winterthur, Kolbe recorded at the Kirchgemeindehaus,Kongresshaus – Kirchgemeindehaus Liebestrasse Winterthur Liebestrasse.ch which had a room with very good acoustics. From 1962, Kolbe's second engineer and apprentice was Robert Lattmann. In April 1966, Kolbe improved his equipment from three small portable microphone mixers without equalizers, dual meters and a ReVox tape recorder to a portable 3-channel tube mixing console, designed and manufactured by Hans Leonhard (Leonhard Electronics, Zürich). This console, which had switchable equalizers co-designed by Kolbe, was used in his studios in Winterthur and Lindau and on most on-location recordings for CBS and Phonag. In October 1966, at the Kirchgemeindehaus in Winterthur Kolbe recorded the Isaac Stern Trio playing the Beethoven Piano Trios, Op. 97, the "Archduke". On 29 June 1970, Kolbe opened a recording studio in Lindau canton, Zürich, Switzerland. The studio measured 161 square meters over two floors. It had a small stage used as storage area. The technical facilities were in a control room with a double-glass window to the studio. Kolbe's first recording console was the modular portable Leonhard valve mixing desk and he used Tannoy integrated concentric coaxial speakers and Studer tape recorders.Studer Studer 1 May 2014. In 1975, the studio was upgraded to a 16 track transistorised MCI desk and Studer A80 8–16 track recorders. Between 1972 and 1975 Jimmy Duncombe, later co-founder of the Powerplay recording studio in Maur, Switzerland, was the studio manager and recording engineer.Jim Duncombe. Duncombe.chPowerplay studios Powerplay studio 28 March 2009Schweiz Gemeinde Maur Maur.
In 1968, Kolbe was a listed member of the Krautrock band, Brainticket, playing keyboards, potentiometers, generators, and sound effects. He was also their producer, engineer, electronics, supervisor and generator.Schluss Dr. Schluss' Garage of Psychedelic Obscurities: Brainticket – 1971 – Cottonwoodhill Psychedelicobscurities.blogspot.ch 21 January 2008. The book Jazz in der Schweiz ("Jazz in Switzerland") mentions Kolbe's work for Brainticket as "way ahead of its time", and Kolbe himself as a "good Jazz pianist", performing under the pseudonym Hello Kamm.Spoerri, Bruno (Hg.), Jazz in der Schweiz. Geschichte und Geschichten, Zürich 2005, S. 153 f.
In 1973 Kolbe recorded the Schubert piano trios in D minor, Op. 63, at Victoria Hall, Geneva.Victoria Hall – Département de la culture – Ville de Genève. Ville-ge.ch The musicians were Arthur Rubinstein (piano), Henryk Szeryng (violin) and Pierre Fournier (cello). Although Kolbe was recording in quad-technology, the final discs were released in 1974 in stereo on RCA Red Seal Records. For this recording, RCA sent an engineer from America.
Phonag's rental lease finished on 30 September 1980 and engineer Robert Lattmann entered into a new contract with the hotel as owner of the studio. On 30 September 1990 this contract was extended for a further five years.Rental contracts between Robert Lattmann and Arthur Lamy. Personal communication. 1980.
By 1980, Kolbe was focussed on acoustics but was still working part-time at the studio in Lindau. According to a brochure of the time, the studio offered 2, 4, 8 and 16 track facilities with the Studer A80 as the master recorder; the 16 track MCI desk, and additional JBL loudspeakers.
Acoustics career
In January 1973, Switzerland left the Bretton Woods system and adopted a floating currency system. This strengthened the Swiss franc in comparison to the United States dollar. Kolbe, being associated with CBS, was affected by the change and this may have influenced him to take his career in the direction of acoustics.Kolbe, C. Personal communication. From 1970, Kolbe worked as an acoustic consultant, designing recording studios, control rooms, concert halls, theatres and multi-purpose halls.Kolbe H. Main Acoustic Activities Personal communication. (A list of activities compiled for membership of the Acoustical Society of America).Brown J. 30 Years of Synergy. Prosoundtraining.com Accessed 25 September 2015.
For instance, he was engaged by the Leonhard electronics company to plan and construct an auditorium for Hoffman-La Roche Ltd., and another for the Bank for International Settlements, both located in Basel, Switzerland.Leonhard H. Personal communication 30 November 2012. Kolbe later said, "By the time the 70s came around I was getting tired of living out of a suitcase and I wanted to spend more time with my family. In a way, everything came together: operas were starting to be recorded on 24 tracks and at this stage I felt that the technology was moving in and the music moving out! Also there was a general slump for classics so I was able to cut down on recording and move back to my first studies, which was acoustics. After all, I had recorded in the best – and the worst – halls in the world and had amassed considerable experience. Whenever I was able to, I measured the halls and began to compile a file on hall acoustics." In 1982, the compact disc was introduced. Kolbe believed the format had been rushed into production.The CD is 30 years old today. What Hi Fi. Although Kolbe continued to contribute to occasional recording projects, from this time, he concentrated on acoustics and control room design.