reel-to-reel

[ reel-tuh-reel ]

adjective

1. of or relating to an audio sound-equipment system or motion-picture camera or projector through which the tape or film must be threaded onto a take-up reel.

reel-to-reel

adjective

1. (of magnetic tape) wound from one reel to another in use
2. (of a tape recorder) using magnetic tape wound from one reel to another, as opposed to cassettes

Word History and Origins

Origin of reel-to-reel¹

First recorded in 1960–65

Example Sentences

The photographer returned to Chicago with a portable reel-to-reel recorder to capture the voices and stories behind the black-and-white images.

From Los Angeles Times

During a talk she gave in 2020, she said he introduced her to Lowry and a friendship grew between them, which led to her taking a borrowed reel-to-reel recorder to his home in the Tameside village of Mottram in Longdendale.

From BBC

For 45 years, Peter Gordon has held onto a reel-to-reel tape of a show he performed in 1979 at the Mudd Club in New York City with a trio called the Blue Horn File.

From New York Times

But UT maintained its own archive on 12,000 reel-to-reel tapes.

From Science Magazine

His parents were both church musicians, and his father was one of the first U.S. ethnomusicologists to study the Philippine Islands, recording Indigenous music on reel-to-reel tapes.

From New York Times