Experience a new sound installation, ‘Breathe in, Breathe out’, in the Sir John Ritblat Treasures Gallery at the British Library. The project looks at the positive effects of sound on well-being and relaxation. It is the first in a series of new initiatives in the Treasures Gallery, exploring innovative ways…

This week’s post comes from Sarah Kirk-Browne, Cataloguer, Digital Multimedia Collections. One of the most exciting things about exploring the sound archive is all the unexpected things you stumble across. While researching the Nottinghamshire dialect, I listened to this recording of Mr Arthur Sharpe (British Library reference: C707/190). Arthur Sharpe…

This week’s selection comes from Sarah O’Reilly, oral historian and interviewer for National Life Stories on the Authors’ Lives project. Enter the Sir John Ritblat Treasures Gallery on the upper ground floor of the British Library in London and on your left you’ll find a pair of headphones. Through it…

By Steve Cleary, Lead Curator, Literary and Creative Recordings. The British Library launches a new web resource this week. It is called ‘Speaking Out’, and it seeks to explore the spoken word in its most forceful guise: that of the public address. Through historical archive recordings, together with new essays,…

Pierre Boulez (1968) Guest blog by Edison Fellow Dr Caroline Potter Pierre Boulez was one of the most important musicians of the 20th and early 21st centuries. His own music is often considered forbiddingly cerebral, not least because musicologists have tended to focus on its construction, but I contend that…