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The World's Oldest Voice Recording Goes Online
Physorg ^ | 3-28-2008

Posted on 03/27/2008 7:30:43 PM PDT by blam

World's oldest voice recording goes online

It's no-one's idea of great music -- to some, it may sound like a dolphin with tonsilitis -- but the ghostly warbling of a French folk song nearly 148 years ago comprises the oldest recording of the human voice, France's Academy of Sciences says.

The 10-second recording was made by a Parisian inventor, Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville on April 9 1860, when Emperor Napoleon III, the last monarch of France, was on the throne.

It was made a whole 17 years before Thomas Edison made his historic message, "Mary Had a Little Lamb" on a phonograph, which is the landmark event in the history of recorded sound.

Scott de Martinville's gadget, a "phonautograph", was a device that scratched sound waves onto a sheet of paper blackened by the smoke from an oil lamp.

Unlike Edison, whose great achievement was to not only record but also play back the recording, Scott de Martinville was never able to hear what was traced on the smoked paper.

It took 21st-century technology and the diligence of a team of US audio historians, recording engineers and scientists, using digital imaging to track the tiny groove in the paper, to make his dream come true.

The initiative was supported by First Sounds, a collaborative US project aimed at resurrecting long-lost early recordings.

The recording, comprising a snippet of the song "Au clair de la lune," can be heard in MP3 format on (http://www.firstsounds.org/sounds/index.php).

Edison's breakthrough, in 1877, was based on tinfoil wrapped around a cylinder. The foil was indented by a stylus which moved in response to vibrations from a mouthpiece. His first recording was the initial words of a nursery rhyme.


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: archaeomusicology; france; godsgravesglyphs; oldest; recording; world
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1 posted on 03/27/2008 7:30:44 PM PDT by blam
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To: blam
Click here to hear the recording.
2 posted on 03/27/2008 7:31:55 PM PDT by blam (Secure the border and enforce the law)
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To: blam

Very cool.


3 posted on 03/27/2008 7:32:13 PM PDT by Army Air Corps (Four fried chickens and a coke)
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To: blam

bump


4 posted on 03/27/2008 7:34:10 PM PDT by lowbridge ("I can't wait to see what he stands for." - Susan Sarandon on her support of Barack Obama)
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To: blam

Cooool!


5 posted on 03/27/2008 7:35:06 PM PDT by dhs12345
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To: blam

That’s great! Thanks, blam!


6 posted on 03/27/2008 7:36:27 PM PDT by JennysCool (They all say they want change, but they’re really after folding money.)
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To: dhs12345

Just like the French to snap defeat from the jaws of victory. Thank you Thomas Edison.


7 posted on 03/27/2008 7:36:39 PM PDT by Patrick1
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To: blam

Simply incredible! Thank you sir.


8 posted on 03/27/2008 7:37:21 PM PDT by Constitution Day
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To: blam
Kind of ironic that it is available to the world via the internet and in an mp3 format.

We take technology for granted.

9 posted on 03/27/2008 7:37:24 PM PDT by dhs12345
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To: blam

way KOOL!


10 posted on 03/27/2008 7:37:45 PM PDT by mathprof
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To: blam

Wasn’t it an old disk or ceramic jar that someone put a record needle to and found a melodic tonal quality to? I remember seeing something about that in a book or online. I figured if anyone would know it’d be you?


11 posted on 03/27/2008 7:40:25 PM PDT by IllumiNaughtyByNature (Senator McCain, what did GWB promise you back in 2000? And you believed him? BWAHAAAAA!)
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To: dhs12345
We take technology for granted.

We certainly do! Gave me shivers, almost like hearing a ghost.

12 posted on 03/27/2008 7:41:17 PM PDT by mplsconservative
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To: blam

Whoa...very interesting. BTT.


13 posted on 03/27/2008 7:42:06 PM PDT by Billthedrill
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To: blam

It’s not a true recording if it took modern computers to decode and play it, is it?


14 posted on 03/27/2008 7:43:09 PM PDT by Travis McGee (---www.EnemiesForeignAndDomestic.com---)
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To: blam; Borges
Thanks for this, blam.

A voice recording that dates from five weeks before Lincoln first won the GOP nomination.

15 posted on 03/27/2008 7:45:03 PM PDT by wideawake (Why is it that those who call themselves Constitutionalists know the least about the Constitution?)
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To: Travis McGee

These are not words, since you need a computer to read them.


16 posted on 03/27/2008 7:45:05 PM PDT by SpaceBar
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To: blam

And through the miracle of 148 years of advances since that first recording, we now have...Ludacris.

But I shouldn’t be so cynical. This is pretty cool to hear the very first recorded sound!


17 posted on 03/27/2008 7:46:04 PM PDT by RepublitarianRoger2
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To: blam
Yeah, post it to the web.

The RIAA is going to have your ass!

18 posted on 03/27/2008 7:46:56 PM PDT by billorites (Freepo ergo sum)
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To: dhs12345

Wasn’t the mp3 format developed in France?


19 posted on 03/27/2008 7:47:21 PM PDT by TenthAmendmentChampion (Global warming is to Revelations as the theory of evolution is to Genesis.)
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To: Travis McGee

“It’s not a true recording if it took modern computers to decode and play it, is it?”

No, it’s a true recording. The representation of the sound waves is recorded onto the medium. Never mind that he couldn’t figure out how to play it back; the recording is there. You can’t play back that which was not recorded.


20 posted on 03/27/2008 7:48:51 PM PDT by RepublitarianRoger2
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