| British Library Sound Archive | |
|---|---|
 The Archive became part of theBritish Library in 1983. | |
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| Location | 96,Euston Road, London, England, NW1 2DB, United Kingdom |
| Collection | |
| Size | 6,500,000 recordings |
| Other information | |
| Website | sounds.bl.uk |
TheBritish Library Sound Archive, formerly theBritish Institute of Recorded Sound; also known as theNational Sound Archive (NSA),[1] inLondon, England is among the largest collections of recorded sound in the world, includingmusic, spoken word and ambient recordings. It holds more than six million recordings,[2] including over a million discs and 200,000 tapes. These include commercial record releases (chiefly from theUK), radio broadcasts (many from theBBC Sound Archive), and privately made recordings. Due to the2023 cyberattack on the British Library, the sound archive's catalogue is currently unavailable.[3]
The history of the Sound Archive can be traced back to 1905, when it was first suggested that theBritish Museum should have a collection of audio recordings of poets and statesmen.The Gramophone Company started donatingmetal masters ofaudio recordings in 1906 (on the basis that records would wear out), with a number of donations being made up until 1933. These recordings included some byNellie Melba,Adelina Patti,Caruso andFrancesco Tamagno, and others ofLev Tolstoy,Ernest Shackleton,Herbert Beerbohm Tree andLewis Waller. A number ofshellac pressings were also donated in the period 1920–50.[4]
Conflicting accounts exist regarding the founding of the British Institute of Recorded Sound (BIRS).
Sound archivistPatrick Saul founded the British Institute of Recorded Sound (BIRS) in 1955, after realising that material was in danger of being lost as the British Museum did not maintain a comprehensive archive.[4] The institute was located in a property owned by the British Museum inRussell Square (with rent and rates guaranteed byRobert Mayer), and supported by a donation from theQuaker trust in Birmingham.[4] A public appeal resulted in the donation of thousands of shellac discs, which started off the collection.[4]
The claim made in the 1995 obituary of British Museum music librarian and BIRS directorAlexander Hyatt King inThe Independent that he founded the BIRS seven years earlier in 1948, is misleading.[5] In 1973 Saul recalled that Hyatt King was chairman of the embryonic Institute in 1953 (the second chairman, followingFrank Howes), and was responsible for finding accommodation for the collection within the British Museum.[6]
The British Institute of Recorded Sound became part of theBritish Library, which had been split off from the British Museum, in April 1983.[4] It was later renamed the British Library Sound Archive. The metal masters originally collected by the British Museum were transferred to the Archive in 1992.[7] Patrick Saul was the first head of the archive. His successor from 1983-1992 was Christopher Roads, followed by Crispin Jewitt from 1993-2007, then Richard Ranft from 2007-2020. The current head is Janet Topp Fargion.
In 2015 the library launched the 'Save Our Sounds' programme to address the urgent need to digitise unique recordings in the UK's sound archives. These recordings are at risk of being lost due to deterioration of physical recording formats and decreasing availability of playback devices.[8] The aims of the programme are:[9]
As part of Save Our Sounds, between 2017 and 2022 'Unlocking Our Sound Heritage', a network of ten regional centres across the UK, was set up to digitise a wide range of recordings held in local archives, including music, radio broadcasts, drama, oral history and wildlife recordings.[10]
The specialist collections are:[11]
The Sound Archive holds an extensive reference collection of printed materials relating to recordings. The collection includes books and periodicals from around the world, a wide-ranging collection of discographies, and one of the largest collections of commercial record catalogues dating back to the early 1900s.
A reference collection of playback and recording devices, including historic gramophones and record players, that chart the history of sound reproduction equipment. Photographs of some of these may be viewed online.[14] In addition, the Sound Archive's engineering department maintains a wide selection of working playback tape and disc players for the purposes of digitising its sound collections.
The Sound Archive provides a range of services. The Sound Archive's online catalogue of over 1.5 million recordings can be viewed online, and it is updated daily. Recordings may be listened to free of charge in the British Library Reading Rooms. Copies of recordings can be purchased subject to copyright clearance andspectrograms of wildlife sounds can be made to order. TheBritish Library Sounds service provides free online access for UK higher and further education institutions to over 90,000 rare recordings of music, spoken word, and human and natural environments. 65% of these recordings are also freely accessible for public listening online.
TheBritish Library offers training workshops and events in oral history and wildlife sound recording, as well as audiovisual archiving internships.
Playback, the bulletin of the British Library Sound Archive, was published free of charge from 1992 to 2010. All 44 issues are available online. A range of British Library CDs are available covering nature sounds, world music, historical speeches and recordings of famous poets, playwrights and authors.
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51°31′47″N0°07′39″W / 51.5298°N 0.1275°W /51.5298; -0.1275
