78s YEARS AGO

Frank Ferrera - A Ukele Song



The Climax Golden Twins are a duo that invest themselves in sundry projects in film, radio, museums, etc. Their latest is a compilation of 78 rpm recordings from around the world compiled on two compact discs entitled Victrola Favorites. The music includes Burmese guitars, Chinese Opera, Persian folk songs, Fado, Hillbilly, Jazz, and Blues from the 1920s-50s. The discs are nested in a cloth-bound, 144 book full of color photographs and illustrations, a visual companion to the rare music within. It's a nice little tome to behold.

Victrola Favorites is issued by Dust-to-Digital. This label produces some nice reissues, and I'm quite keen on the idea of new media preserving ephemeral artifacts from by-gone days. These recordings were the entertainment of another era and a peek into the cultural history of the time. How did the public consider these ethnographic samplings from around the globe? Simple amusing jaunts into the world of the other? To a modern listener, the recordings are a distant, disconnected echo. And yet, through the crackle, they still present an empathetic sound.