Jazz and American Pop Vocal and Dance Music from 1925-1935

Before our era of ubiquitous digital sound, there were analog recordings. During the early days of analog sound, before there was electric sound there was acoustic sound. The earliest recorded sound was created and reproduced without any electricity.

Richard Wahlberg will play 78 rpm discs from his personal archive on an historic, open-horn victrola from 1906. This instrument must be wound-up. Its sound is only amplified by the phonograph's large horn which produces an amazing volume, depth, and clarity of sound.

Mr. Wahlberg and the Art, Music and Recreation Center invite you to listen to early recordings of Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington, of singer Dick Powell, pianists Jelly Roll Morton and Earl Hines and bandleaders Eddy Duchin and Ted Weems, among others.

This program will be held at the Main Library's Latino/Hispanic meeting room at 6:00 PM on Thursday, December 20, 2007. The Main Library is located in San Francisco's Civic Center at the corner of Grove and Larkin. All library programs are free and open to the public.

Readers interested in learning more about the history of recorded sound can check out the following titles from the library: The Audible Past: Cultural Origins of Sound Reproduction by Jonathan Sterne, A Century of Recorded Music: Listening to Musical History by Timothy Day, From Edison to Marconi: The First Thirty Years of Recorded Music by David J. Steffen, and From Tin Foil to Stereo: Evolution of the Phonograph by Oliver Read and Walter L. Welch.