Tommy, Can You Hear Me?
The Quintaphonic Restoration of a
"One Hit Wonder"
by Bob Heiber

The old adage, "The more things change, the more they stay the same" could have been coined to describe the technical developments of multi-channel stereo for motion pictures. Today's warm embrace of 5.1 and 7.1 multi-channel surround stereo owes its existence to the pioneering motion picture stereo formats from as early as the 1940 release of Fantasia. However, over the years, most of these formats were either short-lived or unsustainable due to technical issues in presentation or equipment maintenance for exhibitors. The Quintaphonic stereo sound track for Tommy (1975) is one of these short-lived formats on the road of motion picture sound technology development.

The wizardry of Tommy extends beyond director Ken Russell's imaginative visuals and The Who's rock opera score for the distinction of introducing Quintaphonic Sound theatrically. Quintaphonic Sound, or "Sound in the Round," features 5 discrete channels.

Three speakers were behind the screen-left, center, right-and two speakers, also of equal fidelity, were in the left rear and right rear of the theater. This multi-channel stereophonic presentation was revolutionary in 1975, not for its multi-channel stereo capability but because it introduced the concept of matrixed stereo for motion picture sound tracks.

The concept of matrixed stereo was not new in 1975. Matrixed stereo tracks had been introduced in the early 1970s with the introduction of Quadrophonic (or Quadraphonic, either are correct) stereo for the record industry.

Quadrophonic, as the name implies, is a four-channel system with 4 speakers placed front-Left, front-Right, rear-Left and rear-Right (fL, fR, rL, rR). The format featured 4 speakers of equal volume and frequency response.

Early implementations of Quadrophonic presentations primarily used audiotape allowing for four separate channels to be recorded. However the record industry quickly adopted matrix technology, combining the 4-channels into 2-channels in order to produce a compatible 2-channel/4-channel stereo record. CBS Records was the first to produce a matrix, which it called SQ for Stereo Quadrophonic. Shortly thereafter, Sansui marketed the QS (Quadrophonic Stereo) decoder. The Sansui matrix, developed by Isao Itoh, was considered a superior version and was the choice for John Mosely and Keith Johnson, the developers of Quintaphonic stereo to bring 5-channel sound to motion picture audiences.

One shortcoming of Quadrophonic stereo presentations was the need for the listener to be at an equal distance from all four speakers, the "sweet spot," for the best stereo presentation. This is not hard to do in a living room for an individual listener. But for motion picture theaters with rows of seats stretched across the auditorium this would not be possible. However, motion picture mixers had already been mixing 4-channel stereo for CinemaScope® films since the early 1950s. CinemaScope stereo is different than 4-channel Quadrophonic.

In CinemaScope the speaker placement is: Left, Center, Right and Surround (L, C, R, S). The center channel speaker was critical to the motion picture sound experience, since a majority of the action on the screen happens in the center. Thus the center speaker "anchors" the mix and allows for audiences across the theater to hear the sound with a more or less equal experience.

Both Mosely and Johnson were familiar with CinemaScope stereo and had in fact decided that magnetically striped prints used for CinemaScope stereo sound could be used to exhibit Quintaphonic stereo too. However, the CinemaScope print has only 4 magnetic stripes and Quintaphonic stereo needed 5 separate channels. The pair cleverly employed the Sansui QS matrix to allow 2 of the magnetic stripes to carry a 4-channel Quadrophonic mix. The third track would carry the mono center channel to complete the 5-channel stereo presentation. Thus the final channel configuration for the Quintaphonic track of Tommy was left-Front/left-Rear, Center, right-Front/right-Rear.

Quintaphonic sound, however, was extremely short-lived because of the concurrent development of Dolby® stereo. Unlike Dolby® stereo tracks which could be recorded optically on motion picture prints, the Quintaphonic soundtrack was recorded on expensive 35mm magnetic-striped prints. Thus Tommy was the only film to be exhibited theatrically in 5-channel Quintaphonic sound.

For the preservation and restoration of Tommy, its unique stereo technology presented additional issues for element and technology research. In order have the most authentic Quintaphonic sound experience, Sony Pictures' Film Restoration department supplied fifteen sets of magnetic soundtracks-nearly 150 reels of 35mm magnetic sound-which were catalogued, inspected and evaluated for format and quality.

Though released in Quintaphonic sound, magnetic recordings for Tommy were also created in 4-track, L, C, R, S stereo, 2-track Dolby® stereo, and a variety of mono formats. To further compound the evaluation process, Quintaphonic sound used DBX® noise reduction while other sets used Dolby A encoding or no noise reduction at all. As was often the case with films made decades ago, many of the reels of film were not clearly labeled, so considerable time was spent in the studio to evaluate both the noise reduction systems as well as the Quintaphonic sound decoding.

Once the preferred 35mm magnetic Quintaphonic masters were identified, the tracks were processed with Sonic Solutions NoNoise® to reduce noise, distortion, dropouts, ticks, pops, etc., all problems common to older films. It should be noted that while many noise problems were addressed, great care was taken to not over process the track, so that the artistic integrity of the original mix could be maintained. Thus, the unusual characteristics of the original mix-close micing of the performers, instrument noise, active panning among the front and rear speakers-were carefully scrutinized to ensure that an overly sterile track was not produced.

Tommy is a 1970s rock opera. It does not fit the mold of a typical film soundtrack. Often, in place of representational sound effects (a real car or the actual ocean), synthesizers were used for an interpretational approximation. The mixing style varies from rather conventional to extremely wild, with exaggerated panning, phase shifting and very potent surround information. "Pinball Wizard" and "Acid Queen" demonstrate this to good effect.

Though the Quintaphonic stereo presentation of Tommy was a "one-hit wonder," the groundbreaking technical developments it introduced-matrixed stereo sound tracks and dynamic surround mixing-are easily recognized as the foundations of our modern, multi-channel stereo experience. Fortunately the efforts of dedicated restoration and preservation executives and technicians have ensured the unique legacy of Tommy for future generations.

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