All things Judith Durham A&M!

[AJF]

Hello all, thank you for letting me join.
I discovered the site/forum while searching for information on Judith Durham's A&M releases, circa 1970-1971.
I recently read a thread about a guy who wanted to send out his Carpenters 45s to have then digitized - I could totally do that, as I routinely turn any vital old vinyl I have into WAVs for easy listening. Anybody want to send me their Judith Durham 45s? JK.

I wanted to ask a couple of questions if I may, mainly about Judith Durham on A&M. I enjoy her stereo mix CDs, and just wanted to see what else might be out there. Her first A&M LP was Gift of Song, 1970, and Discogs lists several of the various issues. For the Australian A&M stereo release SAML 933702 (SP 4240), there are photos of the back cover which clearly indicate the existence of a Monaural version AML 33702. It does seem kind of late for a mono LP, but does this record exist? Or any other mono release of this 1970 on A&M or an associated label?

If the mono LP does not exist, I will be even more interested in the singles. Judith's A&M singles labels don't seem to indicate one way or another, but is it quite likely that those in the 1970-1971 era will be mono? For the most part I am looking at UK A&M, plus one US A&M single that while promo does have the usual A/B sides. Amazingly none of these seem to indicate mono or stereo, so I have come to ask the A&M experts what you think?

And finally, are Judith Durham mono issues that I find from 1970-1971, based on usual A&M practice that that time frame, are they likely to be dedicated mono mixes, folded down from the stereo mix, or is there just no basis to predict one or the other. I have read with interest here on the site yesterday about a weird process whereby - if I have this correct - some stereo singles on A&M were made so that they could more easily be folded to acceptable mono for broadcast? But that compromised the stereo sound quality? I think I read this regarding the Carpenters particularly, but could it come into play on these 1970-1971 Judith Durham releases as well? Are records suffering from this process always marked as such?

Thank you in advance!

Judith Durham @ Discogs

 

[AJF]

OK, trying to help answer some of my own A&M mono questions, I went looking in Discogs and found this 1969 Herb Alpert record called Warm, released in 1969. On the back cover (upper right) of The Australian A&M release is the same sort of info as for the Judith Durham record, where it has Stereo - # and just below that Monaural - #, in this case AML-33381. And Discogs does have the AML-33381 mono listing, with nice photos of the labels showing AML-33381, for a 1969 record that seems to have been otherwise issued in stereo. There is even a little "MONO' graphic on the front cover.

I thought this might be helpful with my question about the 1970 Judith Durham LP, as the 1969 Herb Alpert LP is likely far better known by the forum members - I'm guessing?

Herb Alpert - Warm - Aus A&M - mono

 

[AJF]

 

[AJF]

Another aside that I think may help. This is the 1970 UK single They Long To Be Close To You, a record that I think will be extremely familiar to some of you Carpenters fans, right? Is this record stereo or mono, and is there anything on the record label here that tells you so? This is AMS 800 and the Judith Durham singles I'm looking at are AMS 777, AMS 798, and AMS 823. Thank you!

 

[rockdoctor]

Hello all, thank you for letting me join.
I discovered the site/forum while searching for information on Judith Durham's A&M releases, circa 1970-1971.
I recently read a thread about a guy who wanted to send out his Carpenters 45s to have then digitized - I could totally do that, as I routinely turn any vital old vinyl I have into WAVs for easy listening. Anybody want to send me their Judith Durham 45s? JK.

I wanted to ask a couple of questions if I may, mainly about Judith Durham on A&M. I enjoy her stereo mix CDs, and just wanted to see what else might be out there. Her first A&M LP was Gift of Song, 1970, and Discogs lists several of the various issues. For the Australian A&M stereo release SAML 933702 (SP 4240), there are photos of the back cover which clearly indicate the existence of a Monaural version AML 33702. It does seem kind of late for a mono LP, but does this record exist? Or any other mono release of this 1970 on A&M or an associated label?

If the mono LP does not exist, I will be even more interested in the singles. Judith's A&M singles labels don't seem to indicate one way or another, but is it quite likely that those in the 1970-1971 era will be mono? For the most part I am looking at UK A&M, plus one US A&M single that while promo does have the usual A/B sides. Amazingly none of these seem to indicate mono or stereo, so I have come to ask the A&M experts what you think?

And finally, are Judith Durham mono issues that I find from 1970-1971, based on usual A&M practice that that time frame, are they likely to be dedicated mono mixes, folded down from the stereo mix, or is there just no basis to predict one or the other. I have read with interest here on the site yesterday about a weird process whereby - if I have this correct - some stereo singles on A&M were made so that they could more easily be folded to acceptable mono for broadcast? But that compromised the stereo sound quality? I think I read this regarding the Carpenters particularly, but could it come into play on these 1970-1971 Judith Durham releases as well? Are records suffering from this process always marked as such?

Thank you in advance!

Judith Durham @ Discogs

In this area-Eastern VA- Judith's solo projects never got any airplay.
I have no idea if any singles were ever issued.
I only ever heard her as a member of The Seekers.

 

[AJF]

In this area-Eastern VA- Judith's solo projects never got any airplay.

OK.

I have no idea if any singles were ever issued.

Several were, some of them on A&M, as I wrote above.

I only ever heard her as a member of The Seekers.

OK.

 

[AJF]

 

[newvillefan]

Just spotted this thread and had to come by and post. My late dad absolutely loved Judith Durham right from the time The Seekers were famous in the 1960s, and many years later introduced me to their music, playing me songs like ‘Georgie Girl’, ‘A World Of Our Own’ and ‘I’ll Never Find Another You’. I remember him saying how she reminded him of my own favourite singer Karen Carpenter, because nobody could sing like either of them or likely ever would.

Fast forward to 2014, and I managed to get tickets for me and both of my parents to see The Seekers live on their Farewell tour of the UK. It was in that show that my dad first heard Judith perform her solo number ‘Colours Of My Life’, a song I’d long loved and it instantly became his new favourite of hers too. When he passed away five years later, we carried him out of the church service to the sounds of ‘The Carnival Is Over’.

Here are a few photos from that final tour - we were three rows from the front. When Judith walked on stage arm in arm with Athol Guy, she looked frail and unsteady on her feet following her illness in the months before, but she stood at the mic, opened her mouth and that beautiful voice, absolutely unchanged from fifty years earlier, filled the auditorium.

 

[Another Son]

Hello all, thank you for letting me join.
I discovered the site/forum while searching for information on Judith Durham's A&M releases, circa 1970-1971.
I recently read a thread about a guy who wanted to send out his Carpenters 45s to have then digitized - I could totally do that, as I routinely turn any vital old vinyl I have into WAVs for easy listening. Anybody want to send me their Judith Durham 45s? JK.

I wanted to ask a couple of questions if I may, mainly about Judith Durham on A&M. I enjoy her stereo mix CDs, and just wanted to see what else might be out there. Her first A&M LP was Gift of Song, 1970, and Discogs lists several of the various issues. For the Australian A&M stereo release SAML 933702 (SP 4240), there are photos of the back cover which clearly indicate the existence of a Monaural version AML 33702. It does seem kind of late for a mono LP, but does this record exist? Or any other mono release of this 1970 on A&M or an associated label?

If the mono LP does not exist, I will be even more interested in the singles. Judith's A&M singles labels don't seem to indicate one way or another, but is it quite likely that those in the 1970-1971 era will be mono? For the most part I am looking at UK A&M, plus one US A&M single that while promo does have the usual A/B sides. Amazingly none of these seem to indicate mono or stereo, so I have come to ask the A&M experts what you think?

And finally, are Judith Durham mono issues that I find from 1970-1971, based on usual A&M practice that that time frame, are they likely to be dedicated mono mixes, folded down from the stereo mix, or is there just no basis to predict one or the other. I have read with interest here on the site yesterday about a weird process whereby - if I have this correct - some stereo singles on A&M were made so that they could more easily be folded to acceptable mono for broadcast? But that compromised the stereo sound quality? I think I read this regarding the Carpenters particularly, but could it come into play on these 1970-1971 Judith Durham releases as well? Are records suffering from this process always marked as such?

Thank you in advance!

Judith Durham @ Discogs

Somewhere, I have catalogues from the mid-70s that list all the titles available at that time through Festival Records, which distributed all of A&M’s releases within Australia. If the Judith Durham albums hadn’t been deleted by that time, and they may well have been, there may be some clues there. I’ll try to remember to look for the catalogues in the next couple of weeks.

I greatly enjoy both of Judith’s A&M albums, by the way, but I think my favourite is ‘Climb Ev’ry Mountain’.

A quick search of eBay shows that ‘For Christmas with Love’ was available in mono, although I know that this isn’t a title that you are looking for.