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My Treasure - "Wrinkles like grooves brings audio wisdom" - 'Chikonki' or Gramophone By Otomeijin (July 22, 2005) It was soon after the end of the war that I became able to walk and talk. In the chaotic conditions after the lost war, things were so scarce that we kids had no special toys to play with - unlike kids today who are surrounded by numerous toys and gears. I would go out and play together with the kids in my neighborhood every day. On a rainy day when we had to stay indoors, the 'gramophone' (we pronounced it 'chikonki') turned out to be a perfect 'toy' to play with. It was an amazing toy for us kids. It had moving parts, was plated shine, and among others produces sounds! We would sometimes quicken or slow the rotational speed of the gramophone with fingers to produce wavering 'wah-wah' sounds on purpose. We mimicked the strange sounds and were convulsed with laughter. With this gramophone, I memorized Kingoro Yanagiya's "Ririri-rikugun, Hoho-hohei Nitosotsu, Yamashita Kettarooohhhh." (Of course, classical music sources were not available yet.)

As you may know, the records at that time were shellac disks which could easily crack if only hit against something with 'pop'. Today they are called SP records (25cm 78 rev. disks), but I guess that they would be just 'records' till LP records came out in the world. The 'analog' days came in glory, records and record players experienced a number of transitions - from Edison's wax cylinder phonograph or Berliner-style disk player to SPs or VGs and to LPs or EPs, and moreover from mono to stereo.
Probably VG records seem unfamiliar. If I remember rightly, they were 30cm disks with a variable groove pitch and were developed to play longer than SPs (about three or four times (?) of SPs at longest). I remember them because a friend of mine (to be precise, his parent) bought one and played it for me, saying proudly that it could play so long. The photo shows some of my disks. As you see, they are ordinary disks that have nothing appealing in the way they look. The disks in the front row are the SPs and a chipped rice cracker. The ones in the rear are the LP that I first bought, 10-inch records and EPs in the early years of stereo, and red clear vinyl sound sheets known as 'sono-sheets' in Japan. The illustration describing the concept of stereo is really interesting. I have got a rare SP label by chance. I do not know much about it, but was it a short-lived label?
	The recent development of portable audio players has brought us memory-audio players at last. As a matter of fact, they are not new; similar gears already existed in those days. If you ask me, I could call them 'mechanical Walkmans', except they could not be played while we were walking. I mean that they are portable gramophones. (Forced analogy?)
The portable gramophone is in a compact wooden case with a handle. If you open the lid, you find a record compartment for two or three SP records on the lid inside. The gramophone will be ready to play if you remove the crank handle from the lid and wind the spring with the handle you removed. Portable gramophones used to be must items in schools or other facilities and be utilized in various trainings or lessons as well. I remember that an elegant master of Japanese dance was carrying one with herself. I guess that she was a master on demand and was on her way to the house of her pupil. (To be continued)

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