John Paul Livadary; Film Sound Pioneer

John Paul Livadary, among the most inventive and honored pioneers of sound motion pictures, has died at his home on Balboa Island. He was 90 when he died Tuesday. He retired as director of sound recording and processing at Columbia Pictures Corp. in 1959.

That was 31 years after he hired on at that studio in 1928, a year after Al Jolson first brought a mixture of song and fragmentary speech to the screen in Warner Bros.’ “The Jazz Singer.”

Coincidentally, one of the three Oscars to be awarded Livadary over his career came for “The Jolson Story,” a 1946 film based on Jolson’s life. His others were for “From Here to Eternity” in 1953 and a shared credit for 1934’s “One Night of Love,” which starred diva Grace Moore. The sound track’s advanced quality and the picture’s commercial success were credited with paving the way into films for such opera stars as Lily Pons and Gladys Swarthout.

If his reputation outside the industry existed because of his Academy Awards and 14 Oscar nominations, to studio insiders he was known for the patents he held on magnetic tape and multitrack recording systems.

From 1937 to 1954--a period in which sound was developed into something like its present sophisticated state--the academy singled Livadary out for four scientific or technical awards.

They ranged from adapting bi-planar light valves to sound recordings, separating soloists and choruses in a recording room, the multitrack magnetic re-recording system and improvement in sound-level amplifiers.

Born in Turkey to French parents, Livadary came to the United States after studying medicine at the University of Athens. After U.S. Army service in World War I, he attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating with advanced degrees in electrical engineering and mathematics.

He went to work for Bell Laboratories, moved to the West Coast and was lured into the infant film sound industry.

A founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Livadary is survived by his wife, two children and six grandchildren.