Oral history of recorded sound

Long description:

Recordings in this collection are available for Higher and Further Education institutions only.

This collection comprises interviews with people involved in all areas of the recording industry: artists, engineers, managers, producers, musicians, record company personnel, wildlife recordists, journalists and broadcaster, including accounts of the work of pioneers such as Fred Gaisberg (who first recorded Caruso), Cecil Watts (pioneer of direct cut disc recording), Alan Blumlein (microphones), Arthur Haddy ("father of hi-fi"), and Berliner.

Oral history recordings provide valuable first-hand testimony of the past.  The views and opinions expressed in oral history interviews are those of the interviewees, who describe events from their own perspective.  The interviews are historical documents and their language, tone and content might in some cases reflect attitudes that could cause offence in today’s society.

From 'Developments in Recorded Sound: a catalogue of oral history interviews' (Preface, The British Library, 1989)

It has taken a little over a hundred years for sound recording to evolve from Edison's tinfoil phonograph into one of the most pervasive elements in the modem world. The changing uses of recording from an aid to office efficiency or 'antidote to a rainy day in the nursery' to today's music and broadcasting industries, and the technological advances from hand-cranked cylinder to satellite communication, are profound and far-reaching. Edison may not at first have seen the full potential suggested by his 1877 recording of 'Mary had a little lamb', but Emile Berliner's flat disc demonstrated in 1888 undoubtedly ushered in a new world of recorded sound. Berliner and his assistant Fred Gaisberg were quick to realise the opportunities presented by the gramophone, and technical improvements soon elevated it from toy to musical instrument. By the early twentieth century Deutsche Grammophon and the Victor Talking Machine Co. gave Germany and America prominent places in the burgeoning industry, while Gaisberg had taken The Gramophone Co. to many different parts of the world. His recordings of Caruso, Chaliapin and other stars also gave tone to an industry previously dominated by popular songs and comic turns.

The succeeding years are a complex history of technical, commercial and social change - from the final demise of the cylinder in 1924 to digital engineering; with the development of broadcasting and the ubiquitous presence today of everything from muzak to the classics; in the adulation once accorded to film stars of today's pop personalities. The modem recording industry may make most of its profits from the passing fashions of pop, but it also offers insights no other century has enjoyed into many other worlds of music and performance, whether by preserving on record the great soloists of the past, or the inherently transient sounds of improvised jazz. Music that was once available only to the traveller can now be summoned at the flick of a switch, while traditional music all over the world is increasingly subjected to the influence of western pop. Not only music but many other kinds of sound have been preserved; recording allows the capture and analysis of animal sounds, for instance, as well as the archiving of the spoken word.

In the 1980s, while the importance of recorded sound in our everyday life was beginning to be recognised, as a subject itself it was hardly addressed in schools and seldom in universities. Remarkably little research had been done into the history of recorded sound from the point of view of the people involved in its development, and as the history of the industry lengthened it became vital that its past should preserved for future generations before it was too late. It was therefore with a sense of urgency that an oral history of recorded sound was set up, and appropriate that such a project should be based at the (then) National Sound Archive, now part of the British Library.

The Oral History of Recorded Sound project consists of 106 interviews recorded between 1983 and 1987, covering many different aspects of recorded sound; the interviews are catalogued on the British Library Sound Archive catalogue under reference C90. Laurence Stapley initiated and co-ordinated the project, and conducted many of the interviews, assisted by Elizabeth Brett.

Some of the participants that took part in this project were household names, but most were specialists comparatively unknown outside their own fields. All played a significant role in the history of the industry. They include performers, producers, executives and engineers, and also some who remember such important figures from the past as Fred Gaisberg and Alan Blumlein. Besides recounting their own experiences and attitudes, there are often interesting reminiscences of other people - Roy Henderson on Kathleen Ferrier, for example, or George Martin and the Beatles. Two speakers discussing the same person, event or idea can also be revealing, in complementing or perhaps contradicting what the other has to say.

Very few of the stories told have been set down on paper, and they would therefore have been lost but for the opportunities provided by this project. The interviewees were uninterested in giving a performance, but through the encouragement of the interviewer in talking honestly and freely about their lives. An apparent digression can therefore be just as important as the unequivocal statement of fact, and the style of speaking conveys an immense amount of information - confidence, modesty, irony, humour and so on - that could not appear on the printed page. Very occasionally an interviewee requested the deletion of something factually wrong or misleading, and occasional errors of fact are almost inevitable in an extended and informal interview; however, they have a detail and directness special to oral history.

Ethical use of oral history

The interviewees have been generous in sharing their memories - often confidential and intimate - and listeners are asked to treat this material with respect and sensitivity.

• Recordings should be analysed and presented in context, so that the interviewee's meaning is not misconstrued.
• Quotations and audio clips should be referenced as, for example: 'Interview with Donald Aldous, September 1984, An Oral History of Recorded Sound project, reference C90/63 track xx, The British Library. 'Accessed online via http://sounds.bl.uk/View.aspx?item=021M-C0090X0063XX-0100V0.xml 23 August 2011';.

Each interviewee whose recording appears on this site has assigned copyright to The British Library Board and given their consent for the recording to be used for educational study. We have made every effort to contact all the interviewees and inform them about this project. However should any participant wish to discuss their involvement they should contact the Curator for Oral History at the British Library Sound Archive (oralhistory@bl.uk)

Oral history at the British Library

The interviews on this site are a small selection from the many thousands held in the Oral History section of the British Library (www.bl.uk/oralhistory). These recordings go back over 100 years and cover many facets of life in Britain.

Many interviews were gathered through National Life Stories (www.bl.uk/nls), an externally-funded unit within the Library established in 1987 to 'record first-hand experiences of as wide a cross-section of present-day society as possible'.

All recordings on this site are governed by licence agreements.