Archive for January, 2009
And, so it goes
Sometimes the supporting cast changes when you least expect it. Rest in peace Mrs. Jackson. This afternoon, our thoughts are with Steve, Mary and the rest of your family.
Sing along
When I think about my life, it seems to play back as a long-running, ensemble television show. While the series features a small number of leading characters, each season sees an evolution of the supporting roles, themes depth of the overall story line, and occasionally the leading roles. have evolved to keep the story interesting.
Each season has a unique theme and each episode a new plot with distinct beginning, middle and end. And it’s all tied together the the soundtrack of my life.
Music, words and pictures — that’s how I remember my life. And it seems that at this particular time in my life, “Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack” by The Limelighters was my theme song.
Not familiar with the song? I don’t really blame you, but just in case you’re in the mood, here are the words so you can sing along with me at age 6.
[audio:bob1.mp3]
Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack
(Livingston & Evans)
There once was a tiger, tiny little tiger
Playing with his tiger toys
But his nursemaid made him so afraid
He didn’t dare make a noise.
What happened to the tiger, tiny little tiger
Who never learned to roar
He’s just a mat, stretched out flat
On somebody’s bedroom floor.
What we’re saying is:
Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack
Even little tigers lose their knack
When somebody twice their size
Can’t see the world through children’s eyes
There once was a beagle, happy little beagle
Following his tail around
But his mother said “”Go straight to bed,
And don’t make a single sound”"
What happened to the beagle, happy little beagle
Who never learned to bay -
Some burglars came, and to his shame
He turned tail and ran away
What we’re saying is:
Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack
Even little tigers lose their knack
When somebody twice their size
Can’t see the world through children’s eyes
There once was a bunny, fluffy little bunny
Through the piney woods he’d roam
But his father cried “”Come back inside
A bunny belongs at home.”"
What happened to the bunny, fluffy little bunny
Who never learned to hop
Because the bunny couldn’t hop
He hangs in the butcher shop
What we’re saying is:
Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack
Even little bunnies lose their knack
When somebody twice their size
Can’t see the world through children’s eyes
Don’t do this, don’t do that,
You might as well be a statue
That’s how children lose their spark
But if grownups would take part in
Things that children have their heart in,
We’d never end up hiding in the dark.
What we’re saying is:
Hey Jimmy Joe John Jim Jack
Even little tigers lose their knack
When somebody twice their size
Can’t see the world through children’s eyes
Copyright Livingston and Evans
Another box
This has been a bad week. Early Wednesday morning, I woke up sick and spent the rest of the day in bed. My recovery was relatively fast and I was able to make it to work Thursday only to find another box of mystery tapes and films from my mother sitting on my desk. After a very long two days of catching up, and bad news around every corner, I finally got to load the first reel on the tape deck tonight. After some fooling around with tape speeds and directions, I was finally able to make out the voices of two kids actng goofy, singing silly songs and generally having great time irritating the adults present in the background.
The two kids on the tape are my brother and me, almost forty years ago. There’s a lot of cross-over and background noise to work on, but I am pretty sure the recordings can be reasonably restored.
There are several other tapes and two additional 8mm films in the box, but I have a feeling I will be working on this one for awhile.
Thanks, Mom. Suddenly, the week doesn’t seem so bad.
1957 Choir Performance
On an unmarked reel, beneath 20-30 feet of brittle tape and partial recordings from a phono player, I found one of my mother’s high school choir performances from 1957. Oddly enough, these recordings needed very little work other than adjusting the levels, removing the tape hiss and editing some audience noise.
Mom, since I know you are anxious to hear this, here is a low-quality copy of entire recording for you. Can we identify any of the show details, soloists or other performers? Their families might be interested in this as well. Enjoy.
1957 Choir Performance – Part 1 of 2
[audio:choir1.mp3]
1957 Choir Performance – Part 2 of 2
[audio:choir2.mp3]
What’s in those old dusty boxes anyway?
Well, today I dug into the old dusty box of 1/4 inch audio tapes my mom sent me this week and what a day it’s been. I will post more details on this experience at some point, but for now, here is a brief overview of why I wish every every Saturday was like today.
1950, meet 2009
I haven’t owned a reel to reel tape player in 20 years, but thanks to my co-worker, Ben, that was not going to stop me from finding what these old dusty boxes had in store for me and my family. I thought it was most fitting that the player he loaned me was a 1950’s vintage Allied Radio “Knight” tube player. If I were a tape from the 50s or 60s, this is how I would want to be played.
I spent the better part of the morning cleaning, demagnatizing and otherwise preparing to load one of the only clearly marked tapes. Despite my best effort, and the fact that old tape deck worked great, I encountered quite a few limitations and technical difficulties capturing the audio with the quality I had hoped.
Off to the market
Just around the corner is the audio store that time forgot. Tube amps, turntables, vinyl record albums and yes, the reel to reel tape deck I bought for a few bucks that turned into the steal of the century. You see, when I unpacked the AKAI GX 365 D, I realized for the first time it had barely been used. It was in perfect condition and took up even the most troublesome of the reels I was copying with ease.
As a precaution, I cleaned, demagnatized the unit, plugged in the audio cables, fired up Apple Garageband and… well, let’s just say the tape I thought was my grandmother and grandfather circa 1962, turned out to be an audition tape for The Wizard of Oz’s Lolipop Guild.
Wrong, again
Upon further inspection and experimentation, i determined my knee-jerk conclusion was incorrect, this was indeed my grandparents, but not as I remembered their voices from 30-some years ago. The tape speed was not syncing properly which made it sound like they were sucking on helium balloons, and there was no adjustment for tweaking the tape speed on this particular deck.
By the way, according to Slate, helium sucking might not be a good idea.
On June 3, the bodies of two college students were found in a giant helium balloon in Florida. The week before, a 10-year-old in New Jersey collapsed at a birthday party after sucking helium from a balloon.
Anyway, through the magic of Garageband, SoundStudio and a few other audio tools, I was able to digitally treat their helium addiction, clean up the audio capture and am now well on my way to ripping through about 10 hours of tape.
Curious? Here’s a short sample of what I found:
[audio:sample1.mp3]
My life in a box
I just received a box from my mom. Inside is a stack of audio and video reels of my family dating back to the 1950’s. Some are marked with the content (Kids at Christmas 1971, Michael and Bob playing ball, etc.,) but most are not. Two of them have first class postmarks from Ohio, dated May 26, 1962.
The truth is, none of us has much of a clue what family treasures these contain, but it’s now my job to find out and I can hardly steady my hands due to the anticipation.
Audio tape dated May 26, 1962
