LeCAINE Davidovsky USA Badings—Pathways To…Electronic Music 2LP Set+7 Big PHOTOS

$

75

 • Artist: Ussachevsky / Le Caine / Varese / Badings / Davidovsky / Walter Carlos / The United States of America / Berio / El-Dabh
 • Album Title: Pathways to Music: Electronic Music
 • Format: 2-LP Box Set
 • Label: Keyboard Publications
 • Country and Year of Release: USA, 1971
 • Cover/Record Grade: NA/Ex+++ (History of…)/Ex-- (EM compilation)
 • Other Info: This is a truly awesome set.  It was originally released with two film strips but this set does NOT include those.  What you do get, though, is two LPs, seven large, jaw-dropping photos, and a chart showing the general history of sound and electronic music (please see pictures above to see the details of everything I’ve listed). 

About the records first, both of which come in a plain generic inner sleeve: the first LP contains the audio that goes with the film strips.  The program was written and produced by Nick Rossi and narrated by Tom Dixon.  This record details the birth and development of electronic music, and includes many cool electronic/synthesizer sounds throughout.  The second album is a nice supplement: it includes pieces by well-known and not-so-well-known electronic musicians (the artists listed above all appear on this record).  This makes for an excellent compilation of early electronic music.  How cool that whoever put this together was hip enough to include music by The United States of America! 

About the black and white photos: if you look at the pictures above, you’ll see that they feature various electronic musicians, usually with a bunch of electronic gear or synthesizers in the background.  These are not, to say the least, common pictures (check out that photo of a very young Walter Carlos!) and they’re big: measuring 14 inches by 11 inches, they are professionally printed on heavy stock paper and are suitable for framing.  The artists pictured are: Morton Subotnick, Vladimir Ussachevsky & Otto Luening, Milton Babbit, Lejaren Hiller & John Cage, Edgar Varese, Walter Carlos, and Luciano Berio.

The box that houses this is quite large.  The bottom half doesn’t have any splits but the top half does on two corners.

Payment and Shipping Information

U.S. Customers: Click on the Shipping and Payments tab above to find the correct price.  Package insured upon request.  Yes, I do combine shipping so if you purchase more than one item, you WILL save on postage!  I do not gouge on postage and packaging costs.  I send your records to you carefully packaged in a strong, OVERSIZED LP mailer (to avoid damage to the LP cover) with sturdy cardboard squares (to protect the record and the cover), but I make sure to only charge the amount needed to cover my actual costs.  If you have any questions about this item, feel free to contact me. 

International Customers: Please do not use the Checkout (Pay Now) option if you are paying for more than one item, or you may end up paying more for postage than is necessary, as eBay tends to calculate shipping and handling on the high side. Instead, wait for me to send you an invoice with the correct total amount due. I will do my best to contact you within one day of the auction’s end.  To find the price for shipping/handling to your country for this item, go to the Shipping and Payments tab above and select your country from the list.  Yes, I do combine shipping so if you purchase more than one item, you WILL save on postage!  I do not gouge on postage and packaging costs.  I send your records to you carefully packaged in a strong, OVERSIZED LP mailer (to avoid damage to the LP cover) with sturdy cardboard squares (to protect the record and the cover), but I make sure to only charge the amount needed to cover my actual costs.  If you have any questions about this item, feel free to contact me.

Grading Information

With very few exceptions, I play grade the records that I list.  (This means that I don't go by the way a record looks, only by how it plays.)  Sometimes when I have a group (or a “lot”) of LPs within a single listing, I will not play all the records, but this is fairly rare.

I use Mint (M), Excellent (Ex), Very Good (VG), Good (G), Fair (F), and (heaven help us) Poor (P), and I take each of these words at their literal meaning.  In other words, if I assign an LP a grade of “G,” that means to me that it really is in good playing condition, not fair or worse—for many dealers, a G (or even VG) grade is often really nothing more than a euphemism for a record that is in fair or poor condition.

I also use up to three plus signs (+) and up to three minus signs (-) to indicate varying degrees within a specific grade.  So, a grade letter followed by a “+” means the condition is slightly better than the grade letter by itself, and a grade letter followed by “++” indicates that the condition is yet another small step higher.  For example, a grade of Ex+++ means that the record is very close to being in the Mint range, but still just shy of it.

This may seem like a strange system at first glance but I use it because I feel that the standard grading systems are inadequate, as they simply don't allow for enough grades or degrees within those grades.  Many don't use Excellent, for example, which means that there is a jump from Mint down to Very Good—and there are a whole lot of grading possibilities in between those two, the way I see it.