Black History Month – Carlisle and Wellmon

Carlisle and Wellmon (BL shelfmark 1SS0009976) By Jonathan Summers, Curator of Classical Music For Black History Month this year, I was delighted to find early recordings of two African American musicians made in London. The piano duo team of Carlisle and Wellmon made recordings for Columbia over one hundred years…

Recording of the week: Efe honey gathering in the Ituri Forest

This week’s selection comes from Catherine Smith, Audio Project Cataloguer for Unlocking our Sound Heritage. For about two months a year in the Ituri Forest, it is honey gathering season for the Efe people of north eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. This season is an important and exciting time…

Eid Mubarak: Celebrations marking the end of Ramadan and the beginning of a new month

In today’s blog, Charlotte Wardley, Project Support Officer for Unlocking Our Sound Heritage (UOSH), shares some recordings from our sound archive related to Eid. Charlotte is joined by Saba Syed, Chair of the British Library’s BAME Network, to talk about Ramadan and Eid. Today is Eid, marking the end of…

Recording of the Week: The world’s rarest traditional musical instrument?

This week’s selection comes from Jim Hickson, Audio Project Cataloguer for Unlocking our Sound Heritage. Buduma musicians playing the biram, 1967. Photo courtesy of Guy Immega. The focus of this week’s recording is unusual in a few different ways. It’s a recording of the biram, made in the city of…

Recording of the week: Mohamed Choukri at the ICA

This week’s selection comes from Steve Cleary, Lead Curator of Literary and Creative Recordings. Tangier, Morocco by Brett Hodnett – used under Creative Commons license CC-BY-SA-2.0 Today’s selection features the Moroccan writer Mohamed Choukri (1935-2003), recorded at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), London, 22 September 1992. Choukri’s first volume…