korean national museum / 1896 field recordings

[THEVICTROLAGUY]

i was contacted by the Korean national museum to duplicate six 1896 field recordings of native songs. the original cylinders are held in the U.S. library of congress. i duplicated the cylinder from mp3 audio files of the originals. the original cylinders were recorded on brown wax recording blanks. we scoured the U.S. to locate 16 original 1900 brown wax cylinders covered in mold that have been shaved for this project. the recordings are unique and one of a kind, also recorded at 99 rpm, the nominal speed of the Edison cylinder phonograph is 160 rpm. this is a test transfer of one of the audio files to a black wax test blank at 100 rpm. once i have my parameters set and am satisfied with the results i will do the transfer to the brown wax blanks. the cost of the cylinders are $ 100 each, the museum has ordered two copies of each cylinder for a total of 12.

the cylinders will be on display in the museum, i am hoping the second set will be available for play on an original Edison cylinder phonograph, as close to the original recordings as you can get. the recording process allows me to increase the volume and clarity of the recording so the recording sounds fairly bright and crisp considering this was an acoustic field recording made 120 years ago...

[Bahndahn]

Wonderful!

[THEVICTROLAGUY]

sorry about the video, the museum asked that i keep the recordings private until they arrive in korea...