The Old German Radio Station

This weekend I was recording a female Pop singer from Estonia (doesn’t happen to me every day).
On a long day of loud mixing and playing my synth, I took a break and wandered down the hall to the bathroom. My ears were buzzing and I was really spacedOUT after 5 “eleven hour days” of hard work.
On the way to the bathroom I passed a small office with some classical music gently drifting out.
I thought, “Geez, after listening at killer decibel levels to loud drums and guitars all day, this classical music seems very relaxing and pleasant~

Walking back to the studio I noticed again this orchestral music, this time thinking, “Wow! this sounds like an amazing blend of masterful symphonic composition with just enough avant garde / modern ideas to make it incredibly interesting. I realized, “I must pop my head into this office and find out who composer this is, so I can find a copy and add it to my record collection”. I popped my head in and said hello, and the man in the office nearly jumped out of his skin, cuz it was a very deserted long corridor, with many empty rooms, and I’m sure he thought there was no one else in the building but him!

I asked what music he was listening to, and he replied, “Geisthardt” a largely unknown DDR (communist East German) composer”. The man in that office introduced himself as Stefan Peetz and he was playing the Geisthardt music from a vinyl LP, on a pristine EMT turntable into some very high end audio converters, digitizing this long out of print record. Stefan told me there was a classical record label in the DDR (former communist German territory) called Nova, and on the cover photo Geisthardt has a funny white beard and thick black glasses, he looks truly awesome.

I glanced around Stefan Peetz’s overstuffed little closet sized office, which was connected to another small room. Everywhere I looked I got more and more excited. Even though his room was lit by fluorescent tubes (my most hated form of lighting thanks to several intense acid-trips in drugstores and supermarkets in Bellevue) there were unbelievable antique Neumann microphones everywhere I gazed. Some antique “bottle” style condenser mics with these round lolly-pop type capsules (Stefan said they were the best, most amazing capsules ever made by Neumann). He had several newer versions of the bottle microphones, and a brand new Neumann designed specifically designed for lo-noise digital acoustic instrument and voice recording. Then I spied his perfect, rare Neumann mixing console, a small 20-channel affair that looked absolutely “1980s extreme hi-tech” and proudly GERMAN made.

For those non-music producers: Neumann company is to the world of microphones what Mercedes is to cars, what Michelangelo is to painting etc! Can you imagine how cool Neumann mixing desk would be! I mentioned to him that I had bought 2 Telefunken V-72’s in my travels, very special German pre-amps that have a gorgeous tube sound and a hell-of-alot of impact when recording tom-toms and such. He smiled and pulled out a set of EIGHT! V72’s that he’d re-wired by himself into an authentic old Telefunken rack-frame and controlled by these massive sturdy smooth faders. He pointed to a bookshelf full of manuals and told me he knew how to fix every piece of equipment, from microphones to tape recorders. Stefan showed me his Telefunken tape recorder, a 2-track which he told me was made just before the demise of the Telefunken company in the 1980s and was in his opinion, “The best sounding tape recorder ever built, better than Studer, better than Revox”! I thought,”triple wow!! andexcellent”!

Turns out that this guy Stefan Peetz is an actor and a voice-actor (Shauspieler in German) and he had another gigantic bookshelf filled wall to wall with vinyl records strictly featuring voice, talking, poetry, plays, radio plays and stories. For example: WB Yeats, the Irish poet speaking his own works on vinyl. The next Geisthardt song came on and was even more aurally stimulating than the first. I noticed a stunning giant hall ambience on the orchestral recording, asking, “What the hell is that? and why does it sound
different?” He told me that this second piece was recorded at Christuskirche (Christ Church) Berlin in Oberschöneweide.

I imagined that many great classical recordings had been made in the massive wooden symphony / opera hall that was located right across the courtyard from the building we were standing in.

This area was formerly The Alte Deutche Funkhaus (Old German Radio Station) on NalepaStrasse, located just outside of central Berlin. All of these studios were part of a massive roughly 1000 room complex built by the DDR government with their top acoustic scientists, ex-Bauhaus architects and builders. At one point in the 1950s (I guess) til the 1980’s it was a top-secret government “CITY OF RECORDING AND SOUND” designed to provide entertainment, education, classical music, radio plays and possibly controlling propaganda that was broadcast to the citizens of East Germany.

I will tell you a few interesting tidbits regarding our “CITY OF SOUND”.

There were many massive wood rooms stuffed full of Neumann microphones, harpsichords, grand pianos (Flügel they’re called here which means WING), Geithain monitors (simply tha best!) and other killer music gear. One room was designed solely for recording jazz, with a strange acoustic design wherein every point of the room sounds the same as everywhere else; so if I was talking from ten feet away, it should sound the same as if I was 3 feet in front of you. The symphony room is the size of 2 Basketball courts (I guess) with unbelievably high ceilings, all made in gorgeous polished wood, with the largest pipe organ (also made of wood) in the world that’s not installed in a church or cathedral. This recording room for orchestras was built on floating floors with construction that took into account that if a tank battle was raging outside, the microphones wouldn’t move and disturb the broadcast!

(Giant Wooden Opera /Classical Concert and Recording Hall– NalepaStrasse, Berlin)

There is a secret government PATCH-BAY room (called Der Schaltraum) that connects about 200 studios to the main broadcast tower. The patch points are hole shaped inputs the circumference of a golfball, and this space is about 25 meters long with one wall covered from floor to ceiling in these incredible patch points. This room is now used to record live bands, and has a very special, large yet impactfull sound for big drumsets, LOUD amplifiers and punk rock bands.

(Schaltraum Studio in all its glory, You can book it today and I tell you, it’s perfect for recording bands!)

This “City of Sound” is on a waterfront area, secluded outside of central Berlin (the downside is that nowadays, its partially deserted and empty, with the only food available nearby from a Shell gas station, that has cheap ham sandwiches, beer and cookies. The view of the water is really inspiring and vividly provokes your imagination. These days, you still have to cross a manned guard-station with a entry gate that’s raised up to let you in if they know you are authorized and scheduled to work there. In the old days no one but government approved workers were allowed there and the patch bay room is rumoured to have been a spying / eavesdropping connection as well, that let the STASI (secret police) listen in to the many rooms to see if any anti-government activities or productions were being done.

Giant recording room at Nalepa StrasseepaStrasse Berlin copy

Me at foot of fake stairway (goes nowhere… just for recording footsteps! it’s made of 3 different materials: wood, concrete and carpet, for sonic variety!