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Found this Grundig mic set in my collections
19 October 2022
9.51pm
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Leslie Todd McDonald Sr
A Beginning
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19 October 2022
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I’m not sure about the recorder used at the Star-Club but I know it was

a Grundig. My mic set may be like the one used the night the Beatles

Lost Tapes were recorded. Anyone have any ideas ? I see the ones I have

are selling for around $100 on the net.

20 October 2022
4.27pm
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Ahhh Girl
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Not sure about the exact answer to your question, but I just had to look up Grundig and Beatles.

Here’s a picture of the one the Quarrymen used. https://www.bonhams.com/auctio…..egory=list

grundig.PNGImage Enlarger

A GRUNDIG TK20 REEL-TO-REEL TAPE RECORDER USED BY THE QUARRYMEN,
the two-tone portable machine with separate microphone, four inputs to back, removable lid, sold with background details, 30 x 35 x 18cm (11¾ x 13¾ x 7in)
Footnotes
This is the tape machine that Paul McCartney borrowed on occasion from a neighbour, Charles Hodgson. In an interview in November 1994 with Mark Lewisohn, Paul recalled: ‘Sometimes I borrowed a tape recorder, a Grundig with a little green eye, and we’d sort of go ’round to my house and try and record little things…but those were very much home demos’. Coincidentally, the machine had been discovered around the same time, together with some tapes, in the attic of the home of Charles Hodgson’s mother. One of the tapes comprised some seventeen Quarrymen recordings, a compilation made, according to Paul, around Easter 1960. This tape was sold privately to Paul in 1995 for an undisclosed sum.

A letter accompanying the lot is from Joe Flannery, former Beatles booking manager, confirming that this recorder ‘…was used by the Quarrymen and The Beatles during the period 1959* through 1961 to record their practice sessions at various locations around Liverpool, England. These locations included Paul McCartney ‘s home in Forthlin** Road, Allerton and the Cavern Club…’

*Historical pictures of Grundigs. https://reel-reel.com/tape-rec…..d/grundig/ According to this site, the TK20 was first made in 1960. So the 1959 date is questionable – if the reel-reel.com site is correct.

**Hummm…Forthlin is underlined as being misspelled. No, computer, it isn’t.

The specs of the TK20

specs.PNGImage Enlarger

Here’s another hummm moment if that reel-reel.com site is correct. https://recordcollectormag.com…..reel-story – This story has this statement: “Kingsize Taylor and his band had played in Hamburg from October to December 1962. In January he was back in Liverpool for a couple of weeks, before returning to Hamburg for another stint at the Star-Club. Back home, Taylor transferred The Beatles’ material from the original tape onto a twin-track tape, with the use of his father’s Grundig TK 120 recorder.” The reel-reel.com site says that the TK120 wasn’t made until 1966.

https://www.theglassonionbeatl…..ed-to.html

This vintage **Phillips** portable tape recorder is of great importance to the history of the Beatles, for it is the machine on which the album Live! At The Star-Club, Hamburg, Germany; 1962 was originally recorded. The four-track recorder was purchased in Berlin in October 1962 by Ted “Kingsize” Taylor, the leader of the Liverpool group Kingsize Taylor and the Dominoes. The Dominoes shared a Star-Club residency with the Beatles in December 1962, during the last of the Beatles’ extended trips to Hamburg. Taylor had suspended a microphone from the ceiling of the club which ran to the Phillips recorder, and had taken to recording his group – and then others – at the venue. … According to Taylor, he left the tape at his mother’s home upon his return to Liverpool, and didn’t address the recording again until 1965 when he presented an edited version to Brian Epstein to gauge his interest for possible release.

Offered in this lot are two portable recorders owned by Kingsize Taylor: one, the Phillips recorder purchased in Germany and used to record the Beatles at the Star-Club, and two, a Grundig recorder subsequently purchased in Great Britain, and used by Taylor to create the edited tape presented to Brian Epstein. The Grundig recorder does include a microphone, however, it is not the mic that was used to record the Beatles at the Star-Club.

phillips.jpgImage Enlarger

Joe says a Grundig was used at the Star Club. https://www.beatlesbible.com/1…..amburg-70/

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20 October 2022
5.08pm
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Ron Nasty
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Welcome to the forum, @Leslie Todd McDonald Sr.

While a Grundig borrowed from a friend was used for the Forthlin home recordings, the set-up at the Star Club was Kingsize Taylor’s new Philips RK 14 four-track mono reel-to-reel tape recorder (aka an EL3541) which was set-up by the side of the stage and connected to a Sennheiser microphone dangling from the ceiling above the stage by Adrian Barber of The Big Three, who was the stage manager at the Star Club at the time.

Hope this answers your question.

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The Beatles Bible 2020 non-Canon Poll Part One: 1958-1963 and Part Two: 1964-August 1966

20 October 2022
5.13pm
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Ahhh Girl
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@Ron Nasty, does Joe need to change Grundig to Phillips on this page? https://www.beatlesbible.com/1…..amburg-70/

Barber used a Grundig reel-to-reel home tape recorder and a single microphone.

20 October 2022
5.37pm
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Ron Nasty
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I’ll leave him a comment on the article @Ahhh Girl, along with links to my source (which is the Record Collector two-part look at the Star Club tapes which I link to in the Star Club thread).

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The Beatles Bible 2020 non-Canon Poll Part One: 1958-1963 and Part Two: 1964-August 1966

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