Jim replied....

Perhaps because they did not have the technology - they had to depend on their ears.

-- With Big Band, most always recorded realtime. Overdubbing was created to save time and money. Oddly, when technology fueled overdubbing, by Ampex and others, up pops HQ mastered albums (less noise), since the early forms of overdubbing (sometimes known as staged recordings) degraded sound quality.

-- You can record wonderfully with just two tracks, for stereo. Man desired more and more tracks for a fuller sound. McCartney needed 24 tracks to complete Band On The Run album, for example, for just a handful of, ahem, band members.

-- Chet was angered when they wanted to record Elvis for Movie. I forget the story. Follow-up later.

-- Just like real producers with real music created, nothing pieced together.

-- Jim wrote: And you thought I was not watching your posts!

:-)))

Have a great weekend, Jim!!!

Best,
John