MetaFilter posts tagged with recordings

eavesdropping on jazz giants

madamjujujive — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 16:31:05 -0800

The Jazz Loft Project - From 1957 to 1965, celebrated photojournalist W. Eugene Smith made 4,000 hours of surreptitious recordings and took 40,000 photographs in a loft in Manhattan's wholesale flower district where Roland Kirk, Thelonius Monk, Hall Overton, Charles Mingus and other jazz greats jammed until dawn. Archived in the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, the project is now accessible via a book, a traveling exhibit, a 10-part Jazz Loft series on WNYC, NPR's Jazz Loft Project Sights & Sounds, and an interview with JLP author Sam Stephenson, which includes some images from the book. Via a Grain Edit post, which also has some great images. More about the passionate W. Eugene Smith, who abandoned his successful career at Life magazine and his family to devote himself to obsessively documenting the jazz loft. Non-jazz photography: Various images, including Tomoko Uemura in her bath, Minamata, Japan Life series The Country Doctor Life series Spanish Village Life series Man of Mercy, and essay on Albert Schweitzer The Pittsburgh Project An excellent documentary on 1950 photos from Wales: The Lost Pictures of Eugene Smith Part 1, pt 2, pt 3, pt 4

Oranges and lemons

verstegan — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 00:23:21 -0800

London Sound Survey collects the everyday sounds of the capital, including the bells of St Clement's, the call to prayer at the Whitechapel mosque, football fans outside Millwall stadium, a demo in Piccadilly, dubstep at the Notting Hill Carnival and a street preacher at Speaker's Corner.. not forgetting, of course, those ubiquitous sounds of London life, 'Big Issue! Big Issue!' and announcements of planned engineering works on the Tube. (Via.)

Downloads in All Major

Gyan — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:17:37 -0800

Classical Music at the European Archive. Free and legal lossless downloads of out-of-copyright recordings. Formats include WAV, FLAC, MP3 & Ogg.

Classic Poetry Aloud

Iridic — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 10:39:19 -0800

Classic Poetry Aloud: free recordings of 427 public domain poems.

Whalesong and ocean sounds

Upton O'Good — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 14:26:56 -0800

The Jupiter Foundation and the Whalesong Project are both organizations which record humpback whale songs from floating buoys; some of their archived recordings can be found here, here, and here. (Warning, last two may resize your browser.) DOSITS hosts a more comprehensive collection of oceanic sounds, with seals and fish along with its whales and dolphins. It also has a couple of nice sections on how animals use sounds in the ocean. (Previously.) A few more whale songs may be found here and here.

Personally, I've always found Santa Cruz kind of creepy.

Minus215Cee — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 18:55:54 -0800

From 1999 to 2004, a slew of bands, either unknown, faintly famous, or about to go on to larger levels of exposure played in the clubs and houses of the Santa Cruz independent "rock" scene, and were recorded for anthropological purposes. All the music/mp3s offered here can't really be downloaded, but if you were 'part of the scene' back then, maybe you can relive some pleasant memories. [DISCLAIMER: I know the guy responsible, and a couple of the bands. Also, this is my first post.]

The Flatter the Landscape the Flatter the Accent

anastasiav — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 21:39:37 -0800

How The Edwardians Spoke :: BBC documentary via Google Video, about an hour Via Kottke (so sue me)

i:wound

hama7 — Wed, 29 Aug 2007 20:06:56 -0800

i:wound

cohen on the telephne

grumblebee — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 17:25:09 -0800

"Cohen on the Telephone" (real audio) is "not politically correct by modern standards, due to its Yiddish stereotyping, but certainly popular in its time and rumored to be the first comedy record to sell a million copies. This bit primarily made fun of the crude telephone system in use during 1913, when Joe Hayman recorded it in London in July of that year for Regal/Zonophone (it was issued on Columbia here in the States the following year). Several other labels hastily released versions by other artists, and a series of sequels followed right up into the mid-20's." Such as "Cohen Exceeds the Speed Limit", "Cohen at the Pay-station", "Cohen Phones His Tailor", "Cohen Telephones the Health Department" and "Cohen's Recruiting Speech" (all mp3s from The Virtual Gramaphone). There was even a movie.

Something's happening here, what it is aint exactly clear. ..

Unregistered User — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 13:51:20 -0800

Government Releases Detailed Information on 9/11 Crashes Complete Air-Ground Transcripts of Hijacked 9/11 Flight Recordings Declassified Washington, DC - August 11, 2006 - The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) this week released full transcripts of the air traffic control recordings from the four flights hijacked on September 11, 2001, and meticulous Flight Path Studies for three of the flights, in response to a Freedom of Information request by the National Security Archive. The studies provide the most detailed technical information available to date related to the hijackings, and the transcripts of the aircraft-to-ground communications are the first complete government disclosure of each flight's air traffic control recordings.

And how exactly do you kill a sound?

bigmusic — Wed, 19 Apr 2006 20:59:52 -0800

Sounds that must die. Yes, the amen break is listed.

Rodney Dangerfield's lost legacy.

Astro Zombie — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 11:03:19 -0800

Simply mad about the boy. I've learned my lesson from these gay-themed novelty records from the Sixties. I'd rather fight than swish.

The Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project at UCSB

JMOZ — Wed, 23 Nov 2005 16:35:01 -0800

The Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project at the University of California, Santa Barbara is a digital collection of over 5000 digitized cylinder recordings from the turn of the 20th century. Cylinders were the first commercially-produced sound recordings. The UCSB collection is quite large and can be streamed or downloaded. The tracks range from instrumental and vocal music to "old-timey music" to vaudeville routine (including some which are quite offensive by modern standards- see this disclaimer at the bottom of this page). For the casual listener, try Cylinder radio, which is a stream of some highlights of the collection.

Arcade Sounds

rxrfrx — Tue, 01 Nov 2005 14:56:59 -0800

Arcade Sounds. We recorded video games from 1982 until 1988. Fortunately I managed to save all fourteen audio tapes of video game sounds and arcade ambience which were recorded from a variety of locations in the US. Most of the recordings are from Ithaca, NY, Albany, NY and Ocean City, MD.

The Milken Archive of American Jewish Music

matteo — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 06:54:10 -0800

The Milken Archive of American Jewish Music

Manteca to Nirvana

me3dia — Wed, 06 Apr 2005 10:00:57 -0800

The latest additions to the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress have just been announced. This year's additions of "culturally, historically or aesthetically important" works include "Swanee'" by Al Jolson, Edward R. Murrow's radio reports from London during WWII, and "Fear of a Black Planet" by Public Enemy. View the full registry here, selection criteria and nomination information here.

More free music.

dobbs — Sun, 19 Sep 2004 22:54:27 -0800

If you don't know much about contemporary music, there's some good edumacating here: Cuff the Duke, Dirtbombs, Interpol, LIARS, Manitoba, Spiritualized, Stars, Ween, Amon Tobin, Decemberists, Controller.Controller, Heavy Blinkers, Peaches, Gentleman Reg, Calexico, Ted Leo, D.O.A., Blonde Redhead, The Constantines, Hayden, The Notwist, C'Mon, Sea & Cake, A&C, Do Make Say Think, Royal City, Oh Susanna, Death From Above 1979, White Stripes, Tobin Sprout, TV On the Radio, Add n To (X)... some of the stellar bands with streams at CBC Radio's Just Concerts: Live and Studio recordings. {All the recordings I tried were top-notch quality. Unfortch, the streams are Real, but definitely still worth checking out.}

Voices from the past

starscream — Mon, 26 Jul 2004 19:02:03 -0800

Getting back into the groove : In the corner of a California university laboratory, two men are battling against time to perfect a machine that will read old recordings - using special microscopes to scan the grooves - and software that can convert those shapes into sound. Their work could bring history to life.

365 Days re-launched

2sheets — Thu, 24 Jun 2004 16:23:40 -0800

365 Days re-launched - UbuWeb is pleased to announce the re-launch and permanent home of The 365 Days Project. This legendary project, in which an MP3 a day - of mostly outsider, novelty, and oddball recordings - was made available for the public to download over the course of 2003. Briefly taken offline, it is now presented here in its entirety, complete with images and vast commentary on each selection. The 365 Days Project is part of UbuWeb's redesigned, newly-named and much-expanded Outsiders section. via the Rumori list

Grand Royal Auction

boost ventilator — Tue, 13 Jan 2004 12:52:42 -0800

Psst...wanna buy a record label? The Beastie Boys' defunct Grand Royal record label (former home of Luscious Jackson, Atari Teenage Riot, Ben Lee, Sean Lennon, Bis, Buffalo Daughter and Money Mark) is on the auction block. The successful bidder walks away with various master recordings, license agreements, recording agreements and miscellaneous contracts.

As opposed to that authentic smoke...

klaatu — Mon, 05 Jan 2004 15:02:56 -0800

Fake bongs for conspiracists with time on their hands... But can square-jawed MeFites figure out what happened here? Remember, Captain Scarlet is indestructible...

RMN: Remember, within a year people are not going to be thinking of this.

soyjoy — Thu, 20 Nov 2003 09:02:43 -0800

The President Calling: American Radioworks (MPR) explores the secret phone tapes of Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon. AFAIK, the content is all previously available, but online, they've packaged and annotated it for ease of use. It's not exhaustive, but the moments picked out are often illuminating, showing "how each man used one-on-one politics to shape history." You might want to start here.

RealAudio 78s

staggernation — Mon, 10 Nov 2003 19:38:31 -0800

701 78s. A huge set of "old-time" music recordings from 1924-1946, made available in RealAudio format by honkingduck.com. Not high sound quality, but an invaluable collection for anyone with any interest in early recorded bluegrass, folk, country, blues, etc.

Vernacular Music from the American Memory historical collections at the Library of Congress

y2karl — Mon, 14 Apr 2003 12:43:06 -0800

"Now What a Time": Blues, Gospel, and the Fort Valley Music Festivals, 1938-1943
Approximately one hundred sound recordings, primarily blues and gospel songs, and related documentation from the folk festival at Fort Valley State College (now Fort Valley State University), Fort Valley, Georgia. The documentation was created by John Wesley Work III in 1941 and by Lewis Jones and Willis Laurence James in March, June, and July 1943. Also included are recordings made in Tennessee and Alabama by John Work between September 1938 and 1941. Audio Title Index

The John and Ruby Lomax 1939 Southern States Recording Trip
Folk singers and folksongs documented during a three-month trip through the southern United States. Audio Title Index

California Gold: Northern California Folk Music From the Thirties
Materials from the WPA California Folk Music Project Collection, including sound recordings, still photographs, drawings, and written documents from a variety of European ethnic and English- and Spanish-speaking communities in Northern California. The collection comprises 35 hours of folk music recorded in twelve languages representing numerous ethnic groups and 185 musicians. Audio Title Index (As Always, More Inside)

The Quiet American

jdroth — Wed, 05 Mar 2003 09:10:57 -0800

The Quiet American provides glimpses of other cultures via phonographs: snapshots of sound. (The field recordings in Vietnam are beautiful and evocative.) Vagabonding also conveys the wonders of travel. What other sites allow non-travelers to experience other parts of the world?