With a full public launch of the new BL Sounds website just around the corner, EAP would like to highlight this month’s blog relating to two sound projects that have been catalogued, and share some phonograph record treasures and images of singers and musicians from South America and Azerbaijan.

If you are a collector of all things vinyl you may have one or two of these squeezed between the sleeves. Affectionately known as 78’s, these two collections of shellac discs have been transferred to digital for research, inspiration and enjoyment. Although the quality of a few recordings is quite weak every piece of audio has one or more stories to tell.

Valparaíso’s musical heritage (EAP359)

The Valparaíso’s musical heritage collection holds shellacs dating from 1910 to 1959 and primarily contains folk songs and folk music dances, like the renowned foxtrot, waltz and tango to, possibly, the less popularised dances of Western Europe; cuecas and corridos. The cueca is known to Chileans as their national dance because of its cultural, social, and historical relevance – it’s one of the most popular music genres in Chile. However, under General Pinochet it went from a sign of freedom and fun to a sign of oppression and force. But since Chile’s return to democracy 44 years ago, la cueca has lost much of the stigma that it had during the dictatorship. The themes on cueca songs are very diverse, but all are incredibly poetic. The lyrics are usually romantic, and often related to the hardships of the poorest in big cities. Other audio treasures include the tonada – a folk music style of Spain, boleros, and Mexican corridos, which is a form of musical folk ballad that has been a typical expression of Mexican life. They are a way of documenting the experiences of people who often have no other voice. Whereas the bolero, the dance and music is centred on themes of romantic love.

These discs were produced by various record labels, which, at the time, were the top of their game; Victor (incl. RCA Victor), Columbia, Odeon Records and Decca, to name but a few.

With a multitude of dynamic singers and musicians from this collection, I would like to highlight an artist that is one of the earliest female folklore names of the 20th century before the appearance of referential artists in history. Singer-songwriter Derlinda Araya was one of the first to record Chilean folklore. In the 1930s she began a successful career as a radio singer and since 1935 she recorded several albums. Her voice and the panache of her interpretation is very present. Eloquent, emotionally expressive and inspirational, which precisely earned her that popularity, embodied in dozens of records. Here's a recording of Derlinda accompanied with her guitar, singing 'Mi cantar'.

Download Mi Cantar

Derlinda with her guitar. Photo credit, and for more information: https://www.musicapopular.cl/artista/derlinda-araya/

I would like to draw your attention to a rendition of ‘Night and Day’ written by American composer and lyricist, Cole Porter. This has been covered by many an artist over the years. Here, Noche y Día is performed by Chilean vocalist Humberto Lozán and accompanied by the Jackie Kohan Orchestra. It’s always a pleasant surprise when you find a song you’re fond of that is sung in another language, as you can pick up the words to it and their correct pronunciation.

Download Noche y Dia

Pages of Azerbaijan (EAP124)

What first struck me about this collection was the intriguing design of the record labels. The visual imagery of most discs have survived, with just a handful that have been vulnerable to fading and deterioration over the decades. The creation of the artwork is aesthetically pleasing – pretty and effective. No doubt some labels played a relevant role in the distribution sales of the discs. As the EAP cataloguer, when the labels were missing, it proved difficult to identify exactly who the artists were and when the music was recorded.

CEAP124/98 side 2

The other interesting find I had while cataloguing this project, were the images of the musicians and singers, such as this Azerbaijani folk singer below:

Jabbar Garyaghdi Oglu

You can see the intricacy and craftsmanship of not only the instrument but the garments he is wearing. Immaculate!

However, what captured my imagination was listening to and discovering a variety of instruments. Each recording gave me a thought process and insight into the ideas and imaginations of the instrument makers. For example; the kamancheh, which appears to combine systems of a violin and a cello, as it is bowed with the right hand in a palm-up position and held vertically with an endpin rod (or spike). Here you can hear the kamancheh, with the accompaniment of a tar, and singer and daf (drum) musician, Islam Abdullayev.

04_DISQ_QATAR_BAYATI

Left to right: Islam_Abdullayev (daf), Shirin_Akhundov (tār), Levon_Garakhanov (kamancheh). Source

We hope that on reading this blog post you will be inspired to delve into a selection of EAP sound projects from around the world.

Remember, you will be able to access these on the new BL Sounds website. It is an exciting time to try out the new Universal Player. Have fun!

As a PhD placement student at the British Library, I had the privilege of being part of the Endangered Archives Programme. It allowed me to dive into the rich history and culture of West Africa through its manuscripts, and to play a role in making these unique works accessible to a wider audience. I feel fortunate to have had the opportunity to work with such a talented and supportive team. Initially, I had planned to participate in the PhD placement scheme full-time, but due to unforeseen circumstances, I had to switch to part-time. The team was incredibly supportive and understanding throughout my journey, making the transition smooth and hassle-free.

Nahida Ahmed

My initial meetings were with Jody Butterworth (EAP) and Mariam de Haan (Lead Curator Africa), who introduced me to EAP's work in Mali. I was then connected with Sophie Sarin (project holder for the projects in Djenné and Timbuktu) and Saadou Traore (who catalogued the several thousands of manuscripts). I was also introduced to Lucy Hinnie, who trained me on Wikipedia. Through Lucy, I also had the opportunity to attend the University of Edinburgh's "Women in Red" Wikithon online. The aim of this is to highlight and update Wikipedia pages about notable women who were not yet featured on the platform. The idea was also to highlight the rich content of the manuscripts on various pages dedicated to Mali on Wikipedia as well. Whilst this was one of the main aims of the placement, we found out that the Wiki entries would be more suited in the local languages and it was difficult to highlight primary sources on Wikipedia as the encyclopaedic nature of the platform requires context and other reliable published sources talking about the manuscripts. Since this was not the case, we decided to publish a blogpost on the British Library’s website instead.

My PhD placement focused on highlighting digitised manuscripts from West Africa for a West African as well as worldwide audience. Robert Miles, from the EAP team, provided me with the list of “most viewed” manuscripts from Djenné, Senegal and Nigeria, which was helpful in choosing manuscripts to be included in my report. The chosen manuscripts relate to everyday West African Muslim practices such as prayers for getting along with a superior, interpreting dreams, sayings of the Prophet, astronomy, geomancy, prayers for carrying a baby to term and even prayers for cursing the wicked. 

Exploring the manuscripts was an exciting adventure. I was fascinated by the different handwriting styles and unique topics exclusive to West Africa. At first, it was challenging as I had to get used to the anomalies in the authors and scribes' writing styles. For instance, most writers of the manuscripts put the dot of the Arabic letter "fa”/ ف ) under the alphabet instead of above it, and the letter "qaaf/ “ق that usually had two dots on top sometimes had one and at other not even one! I found this to be a consistent  characteristic in all the manuscripts I studied. Another noticeable characteristic common among all the manuscript was  the traditional Muslim opening phrase, Basmalah, which praises Allah and his prophet Muhammad, the equivalent of doxology in Christian practice.

The manuscripts were unique in their own way, and no two were exactly alike. Despite not having page numbers, order of the pages was maintained in some by copying the word of the next page at the bottom of the preceding one. Additionally, some of the text highlighted the name of Allah and Muhammad in red ink. There was also the use of Ajami script, tables and sometimes figures in some manuscripts. For example, "Fā’idat ḍarb al-tis‘at ‘alā al-Shaykh Muḥammad al-Ghazāliy: Esoterics", which I could not decipher due to time constraints and hope that someone else researching the collections will be able to do so in future. I hope that my efforts will help others who are interested in learning about the rich history and literary culture of West Africa.

My report on the manuscripts explored can be found on the EAP website, along with my notes of any anomalies and illegible and ambiguity within the texts. Both these documents will also be added to the Library's digital repository and will hopefully be of interest to future researchers. 

Nahida Ahmed is currently undertaking a PhD titled "Sociolinguistic Study of Wakhi in Urban Areas" at SOAS. The EAP team would like to thank Nahida for all her work over the past few months - it has been an absolute joy having her with us.

This month we would like to highlight five new collections that have recently been made available online. They have come from South Africa, India, Nepal and from Georgia.

The first project we would like to showcase is EAP1190. This was a completely new type of project for EAP. The archive consists of rare astronomical material from the Boyden Observatory, which is located near Bloemfontein, some 1,000 km from Cape Town. It is where the Centre for Astronomical Heritage NPC (CfAH) and the South African Astronomical Observatory (SAAO) are located. The collection contains log books, meteorological records and much more, but it is the photographs of the night’s sky and astronomers at work that has caused a buzz within the EAP office and the examples below, will clearly show why we are all taken by this project’s outputs.

EAP1190/1/7/5 Total lunar eclipse (1946 June 14)

EAP1190/1/5/2 Solon Bailey with the 24-inch Bruce Telescope

The second project, EAP1296, was a further project conducted by Dr Shanker Thapa that focussed on Buddhist manuscripts from five private Vihāras (Buddhist monastery or temple) and Guṭhīs (a religious, community-led organisation) in the Kathmandu Valley. Many of the manuscripts are unknown to outsiders. Some of the earliest existing Sanskrit manuscripts are to be found in Nepal. This growing collection, held within private collections, is helping build a better understanding of the history of Buddhism.

EAP1296/1/1 The Buddhist Perfection of Wisdom Sutra

The first of the Indian projects that we would like to highlight this month, is EAP1300. It consists of Santali periodicals published between 1890 and 1975 in eastern India. Written practices in Santali were initiated by Christian missionaries in Eastern India during early 19th century in the form of printed periodicals. The topics within these publications cover linguistics, folklore, folk songs and specific cultural forms.

EAP1300/1/1 Ḍhạrwạḱ

The other project from India, comes from northern Kerala and focussed on manuscripts in Mattool (EAP1390). The manuscripts and lithographs highlight the Malabari Islamic networks that have evolved over centuries of trade and cross-cultural exchange. Such as these two pages, from two manuscripts, one that deals with medicine, the other is a collection (majmūʻ) of devotional poems and prayers (mawlid).

EAP1390/1/1 Kitāb al-Raḥmah fī al-Ṭīb wa-al-Ḥikmah

EAP1390/1/4 Majmūʻ al-Mawlid

And finally, another project that shows the breadth of content the Programme supports, is this project based at the State Silk Museum in Georgia (EAP1306). The museum digitised a collection of photographs relating to silk production and again, hours could be spent browsing through these captivating photographs.

EAP1306/1/5/1/1 Silk thread reeling (1898-1910)

EAP1306/1/5/1/6 Silk thread reeling (1895)