Recording of the week: in Hertford, Hereford and Hampshire …

This week’s selection comes from Jonnie Robinson, Lead Curator of Spoken English. H-dropping – the tendency for some speakers to omit the initial sound in words like house – has a long history. It’s extremely common in England, Wales and parts of the Caribbean, but rare in Scotland, Ireland…




Sounds from Bohemia: exploring the Bohemian Quartet’s recordings of Dvorak and Smetana

Bohemian Quartet (Tully Potter collection) Guest blog by Edison Fellow Rosalind Ventris, a concert violist and teacher of viola and chamber music at the Royal Irish Academy of Music Listen to these two examples of the opening of Smetana’s String Quartet No.1 in E minor ‘From my life’. First, the…




Recording of the week: The Beautiful Garden

This week’s selection comes from Adonis Lebotho, Social Media Intern for Unlocking our Sound Heritage. I recently came across Robert Pogue Harrison’s Gardens: An Essay on the Human Condition, a book on the cultural, historical and philosophical significance of gardens. Throughout, Pogue reflects on the relationship between ‘care and gardens’.[1]…




Ernö Goldfinger at Open House 2019

In the run up to Open House London 2019, Dr Niamh Dillon highlights the work of architect Ernö Goldfinger.




Beginnings: Arabic music in the ‘Ezra Hakkāk and Emile Cohen Collection

Hazem Jamjoum joined the British Library Qatar Foundation Partnership Project in April 2019 as Gulf Audio Curator and Cataloguer. Over the next 2-3 years he will be working on the Library’s audio collections connected with the Gulf region to scope, catalogue and research them, to manage their preservation and access…