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Post by T Morgan on Feb 14, 2021 16:13:05 GMT
I suggested having a "YouTube for radio" where people could upload what they have 8 years ago on this very forum (see this thread) as I believe sharing this missing material online is the only way of ensuring its survival for future generations. So much is being lost forever because the people who recorded it have "shuffled off this mortal coil" and their descendants have binned their possessions or thrown them in a skip. Even more frustrating is when missing material is offered back to the BBC, or to the British Library, and is rejected! Thankfully there are now organisations like Kaleidoscope who will archive missing radio shows that are no longer wanted. It's good to see the Genome database is now linking to over 17,000 radio and 900 TV programmes. Allowing the public to upload audio files of missing shows would be a great idea as I suspect the majority of the 4 million radio broadcasts listed on it do not officially exist. I doubt it will ever happen, though! Those of us interested in archive radio will have to continue sharing and trading "illegally" in programmes that the copyright holders couldn't care less about... I didn't know that Kaleidoscope covered radio. Nothing on their website suggests that is the case. So is there any organisation out there which is clearly dedicated to preserving archive British radio shows? |
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Post by T Morgan on Feb 14, 2021 16:24:06 GMT
@ Colin Simpson - 1. If you want to preserve digital files, upload them to the Internet Archive at Archive.org where they will be preserved permanently. The BBC Sound Archives rejects items more often than not, but Archive.org never rejects an upload. If they eventually have to take it off display, it will still exist in their storage somewhere. 2. If you want to preserve real items, e.g. video tapes, leave them as a gift in your Will. Donate them to Kaleidoscope now, or leave your entire collection as a bequest to the British Library in London, which accepts pretty much anything that can be catalogued. It has a large collection of, for example, old reel to reel audio tapes, donated over the past 25 years, and still has the equipment to digitise these tapes. The British Library actually stores physically a huge quantity of tapes donated by the BBC, when the old reels in the BBC Sound Archive were converted to digital formats. 'Library' should not be misunderstood as meaning only books - go take a look at the BL's online catalogue to get an idea of how broad the scope of their collections are. Do Kaleidoscope actually encourage bequests from wills? They might not want to be inundated with such material. I do have a friend whose elderly mother has a large archive of off-air VHS recordings, and I made clear he should certainly not throw them away. I know it includes things like Last of the Summer Wine, which is of course available commercially (although I feel there is some value in being able to see such shows as they were first broadcasts). The idents might also be useful. But I wouldn't want to tell him that his mother should leave everything in that collection to Kaleidoscope, as they may not want it. |
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Post by T Morgan on Feb 14, 2021 16:28:05 GMT
Whilst a group of us are researching and recovering Brit. comedy - and indeed have discovered lots of 'missing' episodes - my personal interest is in recovering musical docudramas. These are the forgotten and rarely aired productions from producer giants such as the prolific Charles Chilton, Charles Parker, Philip Donnellan, Alan Lomax, Ewan MacColl, A.L.Lloyd, Brian Vaughan, Michael Mason, et al. The young at the BBC appear to be totally disinterested in their productions. There is a growing movement to collect ad restore their works and then put these out into the public domain - where they belong. Strangely a number of retired-BBC staff are supporting us; many have worked on these very productions. These too are unhappy at the dismissive attitudes of current staff towards these classics. Are you referring to the Global British Comedy Collaborative as the group in question? |
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Post by T Morgan on Feb 14, 2021 16:30:39 GMT
Hi Stephen, I'm sure that you're being ironic when you describe retired BBC staff interest in your endeavour strange, and believe me, there is a big interest in all forms of lost entertainment with the archivists at the BBC. Things come in and out of fashion like the wind but these shows will have their day again; it just needs someone to put forward a well thought out case. But they'll only reach a wider audience if they're in the archive to be re-broadcast. You can't make much of a case if there is nothing to play. Regardless, good luck. Paul The use of socially aware doesn't help either, being a good way to make yourself sound like a miserable old Gammon. I'd agree there - I'm sure many of the BBC staff in question may well be consumed with matters of political correctness, but you can't tar them all with the same brush. They need to be given the chance, surely. Radio 4 Extra still repeats a lot of stuff which is of a considerable vintage, and probably not at all "trendy". |
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Post by Paul Vanezis on Feb 14, 2021 17:58:01 GMT
Radio 4 Extra still repeats a lot of stuff which is of a considerable vintage, and probably not at all "trendy". Radio 4Xtra is certainly leading the way with archive repeats, many from home recordings. Much of that has been made possible by members of the Radio Circle and they do an incredible job. Here's their website: www.radiocircle.org.uk/Please give them a visit and if you have any radio shows, particularly the old stuff, but also material that's relatively new they will want to hear from you. If you have been enjoying archive repeats of things like 'I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again', it's likely they have been responsible for the restored recordings one way or another. Paul |
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Post by T Morgan on Feb 14, 2021 19:41:24 GMT
Good to know that home recordings are being repeated. Thanks for the link - I'll investigate. I'm aware of the Old Radio Collectors' Association, based in the UK, but they didn't seem to have much in the way of archive British shows, if I remember correctly.
Funnily enough, the "missing" episode of Ray's a Laugh which I recently heard is probably a bit un-PC by today's standards, as Ted Ray's character goes to a bathing beauty contest. But such things help to show us how attitudes have changed, so are worth listening to for their social history.
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Post by freddyv on Sept 27, 2021 8:09:00 GMT
Am I alone in fondly remembering Ray Goslings look at the way we lived and made it sound fascinating?
Of course, I never thought to record those shows back then, but have a real hankering to hear them once more. His archive now lies in a University vault but NO tapes are there - I have checked.
I suspect we all recall the TV programme of his house full of newspapers and other detritus as his working life came to an end and he became rather eccentric. He was an archivist, so where do his tapes go?
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Post by Natalie Sinead on May 27, 2022 15:20:32 GMT
Paul Vanezis An even greater shame may be the deterioriation and obliteration of old audio tapes beyond the point of ever being usable again!
Recordings are never immortal.
If those tapes are acetate-based, the oxide has probably turned to dust.
Whether oxide or Mylar-based, magnetic tape print-through is a classic problem that may have turned those recordings into audio basket-cases.
I heard the story several years ago about a warehouse in New Jersey that was filled with priceless MGM and Verve master tapes, some of which were retrieved and rehabilitated just in the nick of time.
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Post by Stephen Byers on May 29, 2022 21:42:06 GMT
One David Bulmer amassed hundreds of master tapes of traditional and contemporary folk music in the latter half of the 20th c. However he declined to re-issue these classic recordings. He even refused to re-issue master guitarist singer Nic Jones's recordings, to finance his recovery after a near fatal car accident. But just about the whole of the Trailer and Leader back-catalogues are mouldering away locked up in the vaults. When he was alive Mr. Bulmer was exceedingly litigatious and woe betide any artist who broke copyright by 'secretly' re-issuing 'lost' recordings from pristine LPs dubbed onto CDs. Even though Mr. Bulmer passed away some years' ago, his surviving family are equally protective of recordings made by influential folk singers and musicians from the 1960s onwards, which they deem not to belong to the respective producers and artistes but to the Bulmer family. Meanwhile the master tapes rot away. The whole sorry saga is here in numerous threads ... mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=35698&messages=161=== |
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Post by Stephen Byers on May 29, 2022 21:45:12 GMT
Otherwise search Mudcat with filter 'bulmer' for Age: All
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Post by Ed Brown on Jun 13, 2022 17:01:51 GMT
Having had personal experience of approaching the BBC Sound Archive and offering a professional disc recording from the 1940s, and having it turned down, I began to scratch around for other solutions. I am definitely of the opinion that if you have a recording that you believe ought to be preserved for posterity, the best thing you can do is to upload it yourself to the Internet Archive at archive.org as this is a free solution, and makes the recording available to the public. In both cases, all you need to do is create a free account on the website concerned, and upload the recording to your account. A quick and painless solution. There is, after all, plenty of free or cheap software online that can be used to create a WAV file from any audio source that you care to plug into your computer. Both of those sites make the recordings uploaded available to the public automatically, via the usual search engines such as Google, unless you specify otherwise. So the uploaded audio files are automatically shared. This avoids the frustration of donating a recording to an organisation that behaves like a black hole, i.e. you donate material and it is never seen again. I would consider also the following possibilities. The British Library in London has a department dedicated to preserving sound recordings. It is a black hole, because material goes in, gets catalogued, but can almost never be accessed by the public. However, if you have a physical item that you want to preserve, such as an old or fragile disc recording, it is worth considering. But, one snag is that they are very picky, and might reject the recording. They don't accept everything offered. But you can leave a collection to them in your Will, as a specific gift; they seem much more disposed to accept something which can be catalogued as your entire collection -- regardless of whether it's complete: in the sense that it doesn't matter if you don't have all the radio episodes, as long as you're giving them everything you've got. Another option is the Public Record Office. They do accept sound recordings, in some circumstances. For example, the PRO in Liverpool might well accept a collection of recordings featuring Arthur Askey or Tommy Handley, radio comedians who come from Liverpool or have a strong local connection to the city. Each County usually has its own Public Record Office. For instance, I have actually dealt with a couple in Lancashire, where there's also a PRO in Preston as well as Liverpool, and if you have a comedian with a genuine connection to Lancashire they are usually interested. It's a bit of a Black Hole, the Public Record Office, but for physical items such as shellac or vinyl discs, or tape reels, which need careful storage, this is a solution worth considering. Again, it's common to make the donation in your Will, but there's no rule that you have to wait that long. I'd also like to mention some Audio Heritage Preservation organisations. Not that I know a great deal about these organisations, but they generally seem to fall off the radar entirely, so I'm keen to at least mention them. You might not even have heard of them. There are three main ones - IASA : The International Association of Sound and Audiovisual Archives ARSC : The Association for Recorded Sound Collections BISA : British and Irish Sound Archives, at www.bisa-web.orgTheir policy on accessions seem to vary between them, as do the types of recording in which each has an interest. They all have differing interests, really. But you can at least access their websites and learn something about them. Certainly can't hurt for me to make their existence a bit more widely known. There is also The Radio Circle at www.radiocircle.org.uk (E -mail: contact@radiocircle.org.uk), mentioned above on this thread. Again, their website is worth reading. The advantage, of course, is that they are actually enthusiasts for radio, so are very approachable on the subject of radio recordings. And very knowledgeable. |
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Post by T Morgan on Jun 14, 2022 12:57:12 GMT
The Radio Circle are very reluctant to share anything with "enthusiasts" though. They have a lot of stuff no doubt, but it's actually easier to access recordings held by the "black hole" of the British Library. Indeed, I have listened to old BBC radio recordings at the BL. The RC website says
"We do not derive any financial benefit from recordings, but simply get a 'warm glow' when something previously lost can be shared with a wider audience." Certainly not my experience of them.
A lot of old British radio is surely Public Domain now, and should just be made available in a lossless format for all to download.
The BBC are dropping Radio 4 Extra as a 'live' station, so what this will mean for radio recoveries being aired is a mystery. Add to that the fact the BBC probably aren't very interested in old radio anyway.
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Post by markboulton on Jul 4, 2022 11:09:33 GMT
The Radio Circle are very reluctant to share anything with "enthusiasts" though. They have a lot of stuff no doubt, but it's actually easier to access recordings held by the "black hole" of the British Library. Indeed, I have listened to old BBC radio recordings at the BL. The RC website says "We do not derive any financial benefit from recordings, but simply get a 'warm glow' when something previously lost can be shared with a wider audience." Certainly not my experience of them. A lot of old British radio is surely Public Domain now, and should just be made available in a lossless format for all to download. The BBC are dropping Radio 4 Extra as a 'live' station, so what this will mean for radio recoveries being aired is a mystery. Add to that the fact the BBC probably aren't very interested in old radio anyway. Sadly I concur with this. |
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Post by T Morgan on Jul 5, 2022 14:20:55 GMT
I'm glad I'm not the only one. I contacted the RC a while ago after seeing them mentioned on this site, but the person who emailed me wasn't very friendly, to put it mildly. They seem to be waiting for R4 Extra to air their 'discoveries', but without that station existing, will we ever hear those shows?
At least with Contributor Access you can get hold of a programme from the BBC. And I think it's possible to obtain copies of broadcasts from the British Library.
The audience for such old shows is tiny, sadly; we shouldn't have to jump through hoops to be able to listen to or obtain copies of such material, especially when I believe a lot is public domain.
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Post by Stuart Monk on Jul 5, 2022 20:44:59 GMT
Interesting comments on The Radio Circle, which was put together when people communicated by letter and telephone and long before the widespread use of digital storage - collections of radio programmes were gathered with great efforts from the four corners of the world at significant expense and almost always on a trading basis.
So I'm not surprised if an unsolicited email asking for some rare recordings was met with a brick wall if the sender had nothing to trade!
Members of the Circle have been able to provide recordings from their collections to the BBC for broadcast on 4 Extra and as a thank you have managed to get 4X to broadcast a few things that were otherwise missing from collectors' circles and I think that's a fair reason not to just hand out Gb's of stuff to anyone who asks, to keep Auntie sweet.
I've never known the Circle refuse a recording that was otherwise missing and I know that members have put a lot of effort into improving sound quality where needed - again, offering a low bitrate copy of an MP3 rather than access to the original recording is likely to have a predictable outcome. You're attempting to deal with Collectors, not Philanthropists...
I'm not suggesting that you personally have made any of these 'errors', just trying to give a flavour of what it is to be an analogue human in digital times - I don't think you'll get many 'rarities' thrown onto Archive.org in the foreseeable future!
Stuart
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