The Story Behind This Haunting 1888 Recording
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- Опубліковано 27 сер 2024
- This is a recording of an 1888 oratorio called "Israel in Egypt." In this video, I wanted to talk a little bit about the origins of this recording, and what it says about how drastically technology has evolved.
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Really fascinating - thanks for uploading and for all the background info. I think this recording was actually made well after the Crystal Palace had been moved from Hyde Park, here in central London, to a new location south of the city - an area known to this day as Crystal Palace. This from Wikipedia:
After the exhibition, the Palace was relocated to an area of South London known as Penge Common. It was rebuilt at the top of Penge Peak next to Sydenham Hill, an affluent suburb of large villas. It stood there from June 1854 until its destruction by fire in November 1936. The nearby residential area was renamed Crystal Palace after the landmark.
As a footnote, Hyde Park was the location for a fascinating recording made by Clara Butt in 1927 of Rule Britannia with community singers and a military band (Columbia 7373)
It just sounds so creepy because you're hearing voices singing from 133 years ago and it's basically when you're hearing ghosts sing today
Haunting indeed & what an era the 1800's was! For the first time in history, we could have audio & visual historic images, which of course, evolved into talking pictures. All 'preserved forever' as folks would say at the time, but all on formats perishable to a greater or lesser degree, tho' the mechanical playback technology is relatively simple. Digital recordings offer the best longevity & should the planet survive, it will be fascinating to look back 500 or maybe even 1000 years or more! Thing is, its so simple for to playback a record or a cine film, but how easy will it be to playback a 500 year old digital image, when the technology of the day will have advanced beyond our wildest dreams?
Q1
Thanks for the video, Nathaniel! I share your feelings, this is my favourite vintage audio recording. My interest in old photographs started in 2007 when I was 24 years old and stood in the museum in front of ancient shumerian writings representing oldest writing system. In that very moment I thought: how strange that I'm living in the era of Internet and easy access to information, AND I'm feeling so reverently about this very first writings, AND I never even tried to learn about oldest photos. Because it's so stunning to see old world not described by words or painted, not re-interpreted, but in the very condition how it really was and how people saw it. To "extend" my own vision onto the past and look on things and people directly, not through someone's mind. So I started to search information about oldest photos, learned about Niépce and Daguerre. Later in 2008 I wondered again - why never I learned about oldest sounds. I started to google, and fun thing, right one or two months before my unexpected interest, oldest recordings made by Leon Scott were re-discovered and digitally restored. That were magnificient recordings, but this one, even if not the oldest one, captured by mind. I used to seat in my silent room with headphones playing this record, repeating it again and again, and tried to recognize more information from this faint sound. Back then UA-cam was already on, and I remember one comment which stated "Imagine how dead all this people are". That was my thoughts as well - even if the recording is heavilly degraded, that's soooo goddamn cool to "touch" something which does not exist for such a long time. And in your video you telling exactly the same. Cool! I wondered in 2008 if someday some specialists created optical and digital restoration system which can extract more sound information from this old wax cylinder. This really happened, but with other 1878 tinfoil recordings, and now we got restored sound of original tinfoil phonograph, one decade before wax cylinders. Unfortinately, I can't find if someone tried to make such a restoration for this oratorio recording. Looks like not. Anyway, I still hope for future technological options.
Somebody did improve the sound on this recording so that it's easier to hear the voices and instruments and the amount of noise is reduced. Listen to UA-cam video zXWO3JOKLts uploaded by Guy Jones in September 2015 under the title "June 29, 1888 - 4000 voices singing Handel at the Crystal Palace, London (Remastered)". There's still some warbling distortion on it from 2:04 to 2:08 though.
One of the main factors that distorted it so heavily is mold. If left in damp, wet places (like a attic or basement) just like food, it can grow mold and pretty much eat through the record, it does massive damage and sadly, once it starts, there's no way to remove it aside from shaving the cylinder which only takes the top layer mold away or preventing it from spreading by putting it in a controlled room.
Thank you Sir.
I love this stuff.
Thanks for this post.
-Edward
Wow. And Grover Cleveland was President the FIRST time then. Great find.
Throughly fascinating upload. Thanks Nathaniel ✌️
Thank you Kerryn67! It truly means a lot to hear this.
@Nathaniel Jordon Do you know where to look for the first recorded lectures and/or speeches of Woodrow Wilson, upon whom I am doing a report? He went to Johns Hopkins[1885], Wesleyan of Middletown, Connecticut[Professor- Lecturer]: 1885-1888, Bryn Mawr[1888-1890] as Professor, Princeton University[1890-1910]as Professor of History and Jurisprudence and University President? His lectures and speeches were renowned for erudition and inspiration. My report covers Mr.Wilson's lectures and speeches from 1885-1923. Thanks!
Watching this now and Kane Tanaka is still alive, mad
Watching this now, we know that Nathan Jordan and everyone around at the time of this video recording in June 2020 did not know yet that the vaccines Pfizer, Johnson&Johnson, or Moderna existed and will start diminishing Covid cases (but not quite yet due to also not knowing yet of the new even more contagious Delta varient). And they didn't know yet that Biden would take the place of Trump at the head of our vastly changing nation
I liked listening to it. You can hear them singing and it's got spiritual significance.
Que bonito recuerdo...gracias saludos desde Perú.
Haunting and eerie.
It's amazing that it's the actual Crystal Palace.
The Baird television Co. used it 50 years later while in trials with their system and the (Marconi GEC?) system for the BBC. Contrary to urban myth that Baird was only good for 30 lines, the Baird system was by that time good for over 200 lines resolution, but they didn't win.
The palace burnt down soon after.
Wondrous time-capsule! Sadly, our current dystopia will spiral down into cataclysm, and your sanguine erudite achievement will inure to the benefit of surviving insects and reptiles who'll evolve to savor and appreciate it. That said, BRAVO to you....from San Agustinillo!
animal collective's long lost single
Is there a recording of this same musical piece on a newer recording somewhere, where we can hear what this piece actually sounded like to the people there at the time? I'm sure that it didn't sound like this live, only on the very primitive 1880s recording machine
ua-cam.com/video/LJjn2RNLrgg/v-deo.html
The 1888 recording begins at around 0:23 of the modern recording, and ends at roughly 1:35 of the modern recording. Also, the musical tempo of the older recording was much slower, I'm sure because it took place in such a gigantic acoustic space!
Search for Handel's Moses and the Children of Israel 🙂
My grandfather was eleven years old. Long time AGO.
Respect brother!!! From Kolkata
I can still hear the voices
It's like there's a bored African drum troupe trying to urge the European orchestra and chorus to PICK IT UP! Faster!
Sadly, we`re all but a blip in time. Here and gone all too soon. But hey, both Voyagers will still be trucking through space long after we`re all dust. Hello to anyone in 2021 and 2121.
That's not haunting That sounds like Angles!
On a bad tape
Très intéressant , félicitations , un si jeune homme comme vous qui s'intéresse à l'histoire , je vous trouve très inspirant , j'espère que quelqu'un va traduire en français , j'ai pas tout compris , même avec les sous-titres , bravo et merci ;)))
Try English 🤦
Social Media in 2100 will go the way of the VHS or the way of the Dinosaurs! That is my guess, but who knows! Who, Knew we would all be using jump drives vs the Days when My First Computer Used B drive Disks(Floppy) or the A drive Hard Shell Floppy Diskettes! which, In my opinion The A Drive disks were not floppy Disks! they were just, a Early Day Magnetic CD!
Insane