Phonautogram

August 14, 2013

By Kurt Andersen

Did you know there are audio recordings that predate Thomas Edison’s phonograph by almost 20 years? The phonautogram was invented by a Frenchman named Ã?duoard Léon-Scott and patented in 1857, translating sound waves (shakily) onto sheets of paper. But for the last century, no one had been able to decode the information on Léon-Scott’s sheets and listen, until a team of scientists and historians figured it out.
One of these recordings has just been entered into the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry. The sound is the inventor singing the folk song “Au Claire de la Lune.”
Audio historian Patrick Feaster, archeophonist David Giovannoni, and physicist Carl Haber were part of the team that restored and preserved the recording, which was made by a quill attached to a vibrating membrane. “That’s the principle all modern sound media are based on,” explains Feaster. “Telephones, sound recording and reproduction, microphones, loud speakers – it all goes back to that idea that he could harness those vibrations and use them to capture the world of sound.”
CORRECTION: Due to a confusion between different versions of the recording, Léon-Scott’s “Au Claire de la Lune” plays in our story twice as fast as it was originally recorded. The recording can be heard at the correct speed here. We regret the error.
Our series Inside the National Recording Registry receives production support from the Library of Congress.

<img src=”http://media40.wnyc.net/media/photologue/photos/EMBED_in-the-land-UBLS_DS_00031_rgb___.jpg” alt=”” width=”620″ height=”401″ />Still from In the Land of Blood and Honey — Ajla (Zana MarjanoviÄ?) turns away from Danijel’s (Goran KostiÄ?) advances. (Dean Semler/Courtesy of FilmDistrict and GK Films)

David Giovannoni examines one of Ã?duoard Léon-Scott’s phonautograms in the archives of the Académie des Sciences of the Institut de France. (Isabelle Trocheris)