Slashdot Mirror
Finding Lost Recording From the 1880s
An anonymous reader writes "The NY Times recently ran a story on the discovery of a cache of wax cylinder records, recorded in Europe in the 1880s, of Otto von Bismarck, Helmuth von Moltke, and various musicians. 'In June 1889, Edison sent Wangemann to Europe, initially to ensure that the phonograph at the Paris World’s Fair remained in working order. After Paris, Wangemann toured his native Germany, recording musical artists and often visiting the homes of prominent members of society who were fascinated with the talking machine. Until now, the only available recording from Wangemann’s European trip has been a well-known and well-worn cylinder of Brahms playing an excerpt from his first Hungarian Dance. That recording is so damaged "that many listeners can scarcely discern the sound of a piano, which has in turn tarnished the reputations of both Wangemann and the Edison phonograph of the late 1880s," Dr. Feaster said. "These newly unearthed examples vindicate both."'"
Quick! Adopt the BCTEA! 2012-1880+50 = 182 years of protection! What if everyone is going to copy this wax cylinder?!!
http://www.nps.gov/edis/photosmultimedia/audio-wangemann-1889-1890-european-recordings.htm
... the first actual recordings ever made of sounds and voice can be found there : http://www.firstsounds.org/.
Those old recordings, really are more delicate than eggshells. When I was 5 or 6, in 1949, or 1950, I was at my friend's house. His father was a professor at University of Minnesota -- and had a box of old cylinders on a table in the basement. My friend showed them to me, and I proceeded to break, two, or three. I remember one being so delicate, just picking it up out of the box, by putting my finger through, was enough to break it. They were dull reddish brown, and I always thought they were made out of clay or plastic. Still feel guilty about it..
I wonder who the first person to say 'shit' was?
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Wonder what Brahms would make of the insanity that passes for copyright today.
Dunno about Brahms, but we all know what happened when Bismark found out about Franz Ferdinand's bootleg copies of his hit song "eis eis baby".
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
It has long been known that Mark Twain dictated part of his novel The American Claimant onto Edison cylinders. It was an experiment that he never repeated. Strangely, for someone whose manner of speaking was celebrated and often described during his lifetime, no one else ever thought to record him for posterity.
The American Claimant cylinders have long since gone missing. Keep your eye out for them in antique shops or your relatives' attics—if found, they would be worth who knows how many thousands or millions of dollars on the open market.