June 3, 1967, Connecticut - Footage uploaded on YT

[iaredatsun]

I agree about 1967 being a peak and great to hear these two snatches of music. I'm hoping that the Tea Party Audition tape might turn out to be interesting. Thanks for the second yt link

[Sheila Klein]

I've examined the audio from the two available versions of the movie excerpts, and pulled them into separate soundfiles, one for each portion.

There are two portions of "I'm Waiting For The Man" -- the first of 56 seconds and the second of 7 seconds, with a distinct edit (almost certainly per the original) between them.

Whoever made the shorter video edit elided a portion of "Venus In Furs" in which the music dips down to allow a few words of voiceover from a man speaking in German. The music returns to full level after that, but the music of the entire section is contiguous and should've been left intact (as it is in the other video edit). There might be an audio edit near the end, but it's uncertain and so I've left "Venus In Furs" as a single file, of 1'16" duration.

The original film broke up some of these portions with segments of an interview with Merce Cummingham, but as there's no music under those I've excluded them from my files.

Thus there are three files. I've posted them to WetRansfer in a variety of audio formats, and will provide a link to it upon request. Send requests to me via private message, and provide the EMA you'd like the link sent to.

[iaredatsun]

Yes please. Pm'd

[lurid]

hi Phil,

sorry about the delay - I've had covid and my mind has been focused on other things!

I don't think there has ever been any intention to misrepresent this audio. I got a copy of the whole film "498 3rd Ave" on a VHS cassette back in the mid 1990s. I believe that it was broadcast on German TV about that time, and the VHS tape was a recording of that broadcast. The guy who sent it to me said that he had indeed contacted Klaus Wildenhahn and Klaus told him that he had nothing from the "cutting room floor" - neither audio or film.

When I got the VHS I immediately transferred the few minutes of VU audio onto cassette (complete with the distracting voice-overs), and freely sent it to anyone who wanted it. I put it on my trade list as "June 3, 1967, Philip Johnson Glass House, New Canaan, Connecticut" because that's what I believed it to be (and still do!). So all of the early extant copies of this audio probably originated from my original copy. (The friend who sent it to me originally was not a big trader).

Then much later I sent the VHS tape to Warlock and he transferred it onto a DVD. I don't believe that a digital version was available before Warlock's transfer.

It has always been intensely frustrating to me that there was a film crew at this event and these several minutes of audio were all that resulted from it!

cheers
Gordon

I've examined the audio from the two available versions of the movie excerpts, and pulled them into separate soundfiles, one for each portion.

There are two portions of "I'm Waiting For The Man" -- the first of 56 seconds and the second of 7 seconds, with a distinct edit (almost certainly per the original) between them.

Whoever made the shorter video edit elided a portion of "Venus In Furs" in which the music dips down to allow a few words of voiceover from a man speaking in German. The music returns to full level after that, but the music of the entire section is contiguous and should've been left intact (as it is in the other video edit). There might be an audio edit near the end, but it's uncertain and so I've left "Venus In Furs" as a single file, of 1'16" duration.

The original film broke up some of these portions with segments of an interview with Merce Cummingham, but as there's no music under those I've excluded them from my files.

Thus there are three files. I've posted them to WetRansfer in a variety of audio formats, and will provide a link to it upon request. Send requests to me via private message, and provide the EMA you'd like the link sent to.

[hallucalation]

I would love to hear audio too, please

[stadtwerker]

Hi, I am the YouTube person (city worker) who had uploaded this newer clip of the New Canaan footage and wanted to clear up a few details. This comes from a more recent broadcast of this documentary on German channel NDR in August 2019. I'd always seen that earlier excerpt of the documentary which had been on youtube for years (which someone linked above), but this new copy I'd gotten was in 720p and appeared to be a cleaner digital transfer. I edited out any non-VU parts as well as any narration over their playing mostly to avoid potential copyright issues, and haven't changed or replaced the audio in any way. As others have mentioned, this was a documentary about Merce Cunningham's dance company and so the Velvets were unfortunately tangential to what they were trying to capture.

You can see the full documentary here: https://vimeo.com/521485453 This appears to be the same new transfer but in slightly lower resolution (540p vs 720p). I left this out of my edit (due to narration), but you can just barely make out the band behind the trees to the left of the dance area for a few seconds around 45:16. It's only a few pixels, but I think I see Moe hitting the floor tom as the camera pans across them to the crowd.

Earlier in the documentary, there's also footage of someone plucking/tuning a violin or viola through some electronics around minute 34. And then after that, as Merce's dancers are performing, you can hear some scratchy droning accompanying them. The camera is behind the person with the violin as they're tuning but I think it's Tony Conrad as per the thick black-framed glasses he wore at that time.

Now to find that Upbeat footage!

[lurid]

Thanks! The original 1990s VHS tape which I mentioned earlier must have been at least a 3rd generation copy ((1) the original tape of the broadcast/(2) my friend's copy/(3) the copy he sent me), so it is great to have a copy closer to the "original".

But so so frustrating!

I have given up on the Upbeat footage, but at least we seem to have the audio from one of the appearances...

Hi, I am the YouTube person (city worker) who had uploaded this newer clip of the New Canaan footage and wanted to clear up a few details. This comes from a more recent broadcast of this documentary on German channel NDR in August 2019. I'd always seen that earlier excerpt of the documentary which had been on youtube for years (which someone linked above), but this new copy I'd gotten was in 720p and appeared to be a cleaner digital transfer. I edited out any non-VU parts as well as any narration over their playing mostly to avoid potential copyright issues, and haven't changed or replaced the audio in any way. As others have mentioned, this was a documentary about Merce Cunningham's dance company and so the Velvets were unfortunately tangential to what they were trying to capture.

You can see the full documentary here: https://vimeo.com/521485453 This appears to be the same new transfer but in slightly lower resolution (540p vs 720p). I left this out of my edit (due to narration), but you can just barely make out the band behind the trees to the left of the dance area for a few seconds around 45:16. It's only a few pixels, but I think I see Moe hitting the floor tom as the camera pans across them to the crowd.

Earlier in the documentary, there's also footage of someone plucking/tuning a violin or viola through some electronics around minute 34. And then after that, as Merce's dancers are performing, you can hear some scratchy droning accompanying them. The camera is behind the person with the violin as they're tuning but I think it's Tony Conrad as per the thick black-framed glasses he wore at that time.

Now to find that Upbeat footage!

[walkonvu]

The camera is behind the person with the violin as they're tuning but I think it's Tony Conrad as per the thick black-framed glasses he wore at that time.

Mr. Gordon Mumma

[stadtwerker]

Mr. Gordon Mumma

Thank you!

[Sheila Klein]

You can see the full documentary here: https://vimeo.com/521485453 This appears to be the same new transfer but in slightly lower resolution (540p vs 720p).

What a great find, hiding out in Vimeo rather than YouTube.

The discovery of the Vogue page is also terrific, and leads me to wonder if it wasn't what people had in mind when they claimed The Primitives to have been featured in the same mag. It's a far-fetched connection, I realize, but several people have reported the Primitives mention with near-certainty, yet no such thing has ever turned up. They must've had something real in mind.