Perfecting Sound Forever: An Aural History of Recorded MusicIn 1915, Thomas Edison proclaimed that he could record a live performance and reproduce it perfectly, shocking audiences who found themselves unable to tell whether what they were hearing was an Edison Diamond Disc or a flesh-and-blood musician. Today, the equation is reversed. Whereas Edison proposed that a real performance could be rebuilt with absolute perfection, Pro Tools and digital samplers now allow musicians and engineers to create the illusion of performances that never were. In between lies a century of sonic exploration into the balance between the real and the represented. |
From inside the book
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... singing “O Rest in the Lord,” an aria from Mendelssohn's Elijah. The record began, and Miller let it play for a while. She began singing along with it, and then stopped. There were audible gasps from the audience. It was uncanny how ...
... singing Foster's “The Old Folks at Home.” Her voice issued forth, loud and strong, from the phonograph's bell ... singing. As the song neared its end, at a point when both Millers were singing, the audience received one final surprise ...
... singing with the record and making my voice sound exactly like it,” she recalled almost sixty years later. This became a key tenet of the tests. While the phonograph played, the singer would strive to imitate the sonic characteristics ...
... singer onstage and the listener in the audience. Like the Caliburn practically hovering on the Castillon, the Diamond Disc could capture only the vibrations of the music, not the unwanted vibrations of the material world. It could ...
... singing about how time was on her side, yes it was, and it sounded like ... what, exactly? Well, it didn't sound like Irma Thomas was standing in front of me. It was more like it sounded the way Irma Thomas was supposed to sound. The ...
Contents
From the New World | |
Digital | |
Death and Other Dispatches from the Loudness | |
Liner Notes | |
Notes | |
Acknowledgments | |
Notes | |