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Lost & Found Sound

Lost And Found Sound: <I>The Mother Ship</I>

In today's installment of "Lost and Found Sound," we hear a story from writer Tracy Johnston about a sound she collected years ago while traveling in Africa. She was visiting northern Nigeria with a friend who was returning to his grandfathers' village. And she was struck by the greetings people exchanged. It was not just what people had to say, asking about every member of the family, the cattle and all your possessions, but also how it was delivered. There was a joy and love in their expressions -- something she listens to every once in a while to once again feel that sense of connectedness. (6:15)

The music used as part of the piece was the following, Miriam Makeba - "SANGOMA" (South African) (Warner Bros. Records) CUT 17 - "UMAM' UYAJABULA" ("Mama is Happy")

The music that followed the piece is listed below.

Lost And Found Sound: The Mother Ship

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

Lost and Found Sound: Manicurists

The Kitchen Sisters, Davia Nelson and Nikki Silva, with Laura Folger present a sonic montage that allows Vietnamese immigrant women to tell about their experiences in coming to the United States.

Lost and Found Sound: Manicurists

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Lost & Found Sound

Lost and Found Sound

In our latest installment of our occasional Lost and Found Sound series, producer Yair Reiner presents Jack Foley: Feet to the Stars. Jack Foley is a Hollywood legend---he did his job best by not letting anyone know he existed. But Foley's legacy lives on in every film and television program we watch---it's there in the footsteps of the star walking down a street, in the rustle of a dress, in the pounding of horse-hoofs. Foley made these sounds and many more on his stage at Universal studios. Foley was there on the studio's maiden voyage into sound pictures. At first, he and his team of sound men had only one chance to get all the sound right. Foley figured out that by projecting the film and recording the sound effects in sync, he would get the best effect---and he would do each effect one at a time, till the various sounds were all put together with the film--a method today called Foley. Foley's stage looked more like a garage than a recording studio---dirt, gravel, and lots of junk everywhere. These were the tools of his trade. Foley's voice was never recorded and there are no pictures of him at his work---but he is remembered by those who worked with him.

Lost and Found Sound

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Lost & Found Sound

Lost and Found Sound: <I>The House of Night</I>

This year we're continuing our Lost and Found Sound series on an occasional basis. Today's installment, "The House of Night," is the story of the Mojave Indians, their language and their songs and one man who tried to preserve both for future generations. Beginning in the mid-1960's Guy Tyler began making recordings of the Mojave language and of their 525 song cycle, called the Creation Song. This 13 hour song is a map of the tribe's origins. The songs describe celestial cycles, the positions of stars, planets, and elaborate descriptions of migratory birds.

Lost and Found Sound: The House of Night

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

Lost and Found Sound Finale

Quest For Sound Curator Jay Allison brings down the curtain on our year-long series, Lost and Found Sound, by playing examples of some of the listener calls that came in this year answering our plea for hidden audio artifacts. He laments that we never heard the talking seal, but then plays a short example. Allison takes us on a walk through the various kinds of sounds we learned about: ancestors passing messages to their descendants, voices of youth returning on record in old age, and many more. And, we hear the sound that initiated the series: a mysterious record made to a World War Two solider by his lover or wife back home.

Lost and Found Sound Finale

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

LOST & FOUND SOUND: Vermont Folklore Recordings

Reporter Nina Keck of Vermont Public Radio tells us about the 35-year obsession of a woman named Helen Hartness Flanders to capture a vanishing breed of Vermonter on recorded media. She started in the 1930s with wax cylinder, then graduated to disk and tape. She sought out elderly residents, and had them sing and tell stories.

LOST & FOUND SOUND: Vermont Folklore Recordings

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Lost & Found Sound

LOST AND FOUND SOUND: Walkin' Talkin' Bill Hawkins

Lost and Found Sound presents the story of William Allen Taylor, a disk jockey and a bit of an actor, who went looking for the sound of the voice of his father. Taylor was born out of wedlock. It was only late in life that Taylor discovered his father was Walkin' Talkin' Bill Hawkins -- a former Pullman reporter who in 1948 became Cleveland's first black disk jockey. Hawkins broadcast live from the window of his record store, and was widely influential. But there are no known recordings of Hawkins' voice. So, by talking to those who knew Hawkins and listened to his program, William Allen Taylor attempts to bring his father's voice to life again through imitation.

LOST AND FOUND SOUND: Walkin' Talkin' Bill Hawkins

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

LOST & FOUND SOUND: That Was the Week That Was

Art Chimes had a single TV sound obsession: a satirical TV show on NBC from 1964-65 called "That Was The Week That Was" (TW3), which introduced David Frost to American viewers. The show's sharp wit caught Chimes' fancy as a teenager in New Jersey. The most striking thing about the show was the opening song sung by Nancy Ames, which contained all the week's news. Chimes says the show was a smart viewing choice in days of clownish variety shows.

LOST & FOUND SOUND: That Was the Week That Was

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

Obsessed With TV Sound

Our year-long series visits a man obsessed with the sound of TV. Phil Gries started recording audio from his television set in the 1950s. He still has over 10-thousand items, and has turned his hobby into a business -- supplying audio from old TV shows to other collectors and museums. He says he was motivated by the ethereal nature of live TV to preserve broadcasts of all sorts.

Obsessed With TV Sound

Audio will be available later today.

Lost & Found Sound

LOST & FOUND SOUND: WHER - One Thousand Beautiful Watts

A story about radio station WHER in Memphis, billed as the first "All-Girl Radio Station" in the nation. It was started by Sam Phillips of Sun Studio fame in 1955 - just after he sold Elvis Presley's contract to Colonel Parker. Phillips gave women a chance to work both on the air, and in the sales department. It lasted 17-years. Independent producers Nikki Silva and Davia Nelson located 14 of the 40 women who worked at WHER.

LOST & FOUND SOUND: WHER - One Thousand Beautiful Watts

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

Lost & Found Sound: Downloading the Repertoire

In this week's installment of Lost and Found Sound, "Quest for Sound" Curator Jay Allison introduces David Greenberger. Greenberger made a strange tape recording back in 1981 of a man who sang 129 songs in 45-minutes. The singer was a gentleman named Jack Murdurian, who renders popular music items one after another in the same careless, toneless cadences. The recording and Jack's memory are both "lost and found."

Lost & Found Sound: Downloading the Repertoire

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

Lost and Found Sound: 20th Century Cylinders

Lost and Found Sound presents a story about present-day uses of the most ancient of recording technologies: the wax cylinder. On the occasion of this month's release by trumpeter Wynton Marsalis's album of wax cylinder recordings, we hear what it is about wax that appeals to some. For Marsalis it's the authentic sound, which reminds him of the jazz greats of the past. Also featured: Les Paul and the band They Might be Giants. John Flansburgh of the "Giants" learns that to get recorded, he has to stick his head into a brass cone and sing in a very pronounced way.

Lost and Found Sound: 20th Century Cylinders

Only Available in Archive Formats.

Lost & Found Sound

CKLW: The Hits Just Keep on Coming

In this latest installment of our Lost and Found Sound series, NPR's Don Gonyea remembers the heyday of powerhouse AM radio. Gonyea grew up in Detroit, where the big station in the 60's and 70's was CKLW. It broadcast from across the Detroit River in Windsor, Ontario. It was a loud, glitzy noise-making enterprise. Everything was shouted -- even the news. The 50,000-watt giant spewed rock and roll and hyped-news across 28 states and mid-Canada. Gonyea describes the formula that made CKLW and its imitators successful.

CKLW: The Hits Just Keep on Coming

Only Available in Archive Formats.