An evocation of emotional memory for the healing of past trauma, separation and loss

Guest blog by Edison Fellow Jonathan Emeruwa

Fisk Jubilee Singers

 

I am hoping to show through my essay the way in which melodic arrangement in certain African American classical music compositions and African American spirituals from the late 19^th century have been used by both the artist and the composer as a way to convey the healing of past trauma through the expression of music; the process of remembering and making sense of the emotions being expressed through song. The melodies can serve a therapeutic purpose, which is also inherent in the musical tradition of the African American’s struggle for liberation.

Introduction

I had been fascinated with the music of the black spiritual for a very long time, ever since my early experiences as a boy, hearing gospel and Catholic hymns in my local church as well as being brought up in a Roman Catholic school and experiencing African traditional Igbo music from Nigeria. Of course, besides the traditional spiritual beliefs, Christianity is also a widely practiced religion amongst the Igbo people and gospel songs are an important part of religious practices. Later on, I had become more acquainted with the music of African American spirituals, folk and blues, as well as the impact of the transatlantic slave trade and the way that traditional African music from the continent had greatly influenced these genres.

The idea of loss and expressing sorrowful experiences for reparation in song seemed to be recurrent themes in many of the recordings I had listened to growing up. In regard to the songs of the spirituals, I have been particularly interested in the way that the music of black spirituals had seeped into other Western forms of music, most notably classical, but was concerned how little has been written about this.

After hearing about the wonderful work of the British Library and their Sound Archive, I felt I had to pursue research there and applied for an Edison Fellowship. I was very excited to be able to access recordings from the collections to help begin my investigation.

Starting off

I had decided to start researching into the composers first. I had read about several black composers influenced by the black spirituals from America such as the more widely known William Grant Still. However, I had also heard about the musicians Carlisle and Wellmon who were less known. Classical Curator Jonathan Summers had written a wonderful British Library blog for Black History Month on the African American British duo, which I was able to read. The second resource that I was able to use which was an absolute treasure trove of information was the publication by Bear Family Records ‘Black Europe’, which I was able to access at the British Library. The two books accompanying the recordings had really helped my writing and the incredible curators at the Library, particularly Jonathan Summers, have also been there to guide me in finding the appropriate material. It’s been great to receive this support from the Fellowship; I will now illustrate my findings.

Carlisle and Wellmon

Harry M. Wellmon was born in Shelby North Carolina on the 15 May 1883. As a young child Wellman went to New York City where he made a name for himself as a drum major champion of the world. He had become an MC at the annual concert ball and cakewalk at Harlem River Casino in 1898 and worked for a music publisher where he gained important experiences in this field.

Wellmon’s first song was called ‘Sweet Dreams’ and most likely his first publication in 1903. In 1906 he established himself as a composer and had contributed to the comic operetta ‘King of Sahara’, which opened in London on the 28 May. Since then, he wrote for Edwardian music hall artists and was proclaimed a ‘born genius’ by a report published in ‘Entr’acte’ August 1906.

Later on in his life, Wellmon had formed the duo Carlisle and Wellmon with the pianist George Carlisle who was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota on the 11 March 1883. He had studied piano at the Northwest Conservatory in Chicago and Boston Conservatory. He began his career as a classical pianist later switching to vernacular music and made his way to Britain in September 1908 with the duo Carlisle and Baker. Carlisle and Wellmon were a ragtime and revelry act singing and playing their own compositions. The act had continued touring through 1911 and 1912 and in the autumn of 1912 made several recordings. Four of the six sides recorded had been written by the pair.

The recording that I was most interested in listening to was ‘Why do you Wait for Tomorrow’ (from the Black Europe Collection) the second side to ‘A Prescription for Love.’ ‘Why do you Wait for Tomorrow’ was a joint duet recorded by the pair. Described as a ‘tearjerker’ it is a slow waltz as described in the ‘Black Europe’ book. I found it’s sorrowful and mournful style very reminiscent of the black spiritual tradition of song. I think this is of interest as this is not a song that gets discussed very often. Though this American-born British duo seemed to capture something here, they sing about love ruling the world today and posing the question; Why do you wait for tomorrow? Could they be referring to a specific person, perhaps a love interest, or is the question being posed to the audience? One can only wonder.

'Why do you wait for tomorrow' by Carlisle & Wellmon, 1912

The classical composers R. Nathaniel Dett and Harry Burleigh would make a new concert stage repertoire by applying Western classical techniques to the spiritual. Other composers that were also inspired in this way were William Grant Still, Samuel Coleridge Taylor and Fela Sowande.

William Grant Still

William Grant Still was very much known as the Dean of Afro-American composers and both of his parents were African Americans. He had been brought from a segregated Mississippi to Little Rock, Arkansas. The location was known as a hub for black intellectuals and the famous orator Frederick Douglass had made speeches there. Still moved to Harlem where he worked with WC Handy, playing the oboe. His compositions were ground breaking and it was also the first time an American orchestra had ever played a symphonic work by a black man, being brought up in southern segregated America. His background both as an African American and composer had really intrigued me as well as the ideas behind his great work.

At the British Library I found an absolutely mesmerising and beautiful piece by Still. It had been a while since I listened to his music but after listening to this song, I felt a strong sense of nostalgia and, as a listener, also a sense of determination and resilience of the African American human spirit. The recording in question was his famous composition ‘Afro American Symphony.’ I also thought it would be useful to have some context as well and in addition found an interview where the composer spoke about this work.

Samuel Coleridge Taylor

Samuel Coleridge Taylor was the first black composer from England, born in the year 1875. Having attended the Royal College of Music, his interest came about after having heard the Fisk Jubilee Singers, an African American a capella ensemble established in 1871. His initial work strongly featured African American themes, which was very aligned with the Black Spiritual aesthetic of the time featuring melancholy and uplifting melodies very reminiscent of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, church preaching songs and hymns.

I had decided to listen to a particular recording entitled ‘Danse Negre’. Uplifting, majestic and turbulent, a dance of black consciousness and the African. African American dance and music can be seen as a way of freedom from bondage allowing expression under oppression, to reconnect with one’s homeland and ancestors. There seemed to be a sense of hope and strength to the music, not only in the conveyance of melody, but also the tempo and pacing. I was thinking of the function of musical expression as a conveyer of emotions and feelings.

To this I will draw reference to the works of Theodor Reik a Psychoanalyst in his book The Haunting Melody: Psychoanalytic Experiences in Life and Music. Reik had discussed the associations between an individual’s music and its concealed meaning and how certain types of melodies may exude repetitiveness, which may link to trauma or difficult unprocessed experiences. A very good example of this is in the repetitive blues chords which have roots in spirituals, gospel and folk music which allow the singer a simple melodic framework to express feelings repeatedly, including heartache and sadness through techniques such as call and response, emotionally expressive singing, and shouts and wailing characteristic in African indigenous music.

Fela Sowande

Fela Sowande was a Nigerian composer who had lived in America during his career and was most known for his compositions for organ. He was, perhaps for the first time, able to bring Yoruba culture and influence to the popular Western concert stage. One of his most famous compositions was his African Suite composed in 1955, during the time that Nigeria was still under British colonial rule and, (also symbolically) music for the 1960s Nigerian independence. His influences were also clearly rooted in the Negro Spirituals tradition, which he very much related to the mythologies and traditional folktales of Africa; Yoruba has a very rich history of folklore and folk stories embedded in its traditions and music.

‘Deep River’ Arranged by Frederick Tills

Slaves never let the light go out. Survival meant having steadfast dedication and determination, and most of all, a will to live. Hope eternal, faith always shining, they knew their real home, whilst somewhere over Jordan across a deep river, oh don’t you want to go to that promised land where all is peace. ‘Deep River.

(The introduction to ‘Deep River’ with arrangement by Frederick Tillis).

Arranged by Frederick Tillis from the Symphonic Spirituals and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. This composition, a melancholy song of mourning, loss and longing really encapsulates the recurrent themes and tone of the music of the African American spirituals.

'Deep River' arranged by Frederick Tills

The spirituals

Spirituals is a Christian music associated with African Americans merging African traditions with their experiences of slavery during the transatlantic slave trade. Among some of the themes present in the music are songs of work, sing songs, songs from the plantation in the field which would later evolve into blues and gospel.

It was in the 1870s that African Americans began to present Christian hymns and spirituals on a wide scale in the United States. The most important group of singers to embody the black spirituals at this time were the Jubilee Singers of Fisk University. In my pursuit to discover more about the singers I was recommended to source the book The Story of the Jubilee Singers with their Songs by JBT Marsh, which the British Library were able to provide guidance with.

Black spirituals and the music of the Jubilee Singers of Fisk University

On January 31 1865, through the 13^th Amendment passed by Congress, slavery was officially abolished in the United States. Support was given to promote economic upliftment and a drive towards education. In 1866 the American Missionary Association (AMA), a group of abolitionists and religious leaders who sought to provide educational opportunities for formerly enslaved African Americans, founded Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. The early years of Fisk were challenging and the university struggled financially, operating from a simple wooden building. However, with the dedication of its faculty and students, Fisk managed to survive and thrive and the original humble building was replaced.

One of the most significant events in Fisk’s early history was the establishment of the nine-member choral ensemble, the Fisk Jubilee Singers, in 1871. The group was founded primarily to raise funds for the university, and was led by George White, a music professor and the University treasurer. The members consisted of Isaac Dickerson, Ben Holmes, Greene Evans, Thomas Rutling, Ella Shepphard, Maggie Porter, Minnie Tate, Jennie Jackson and Eliza Walker. Together they left for Ohio in 1871, travelling through New York and Connecticut, introducing the music of the black spirituals for the first time. Through their touring they were able to save $20,000 and make a second tour. Over the entire 18 months they were also able to visit Rhode Island, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland and Washington DC. They were also a group that generously donated small profits to victims of the Great Chicago fire of October 1871, despite the hardships they faced whilst starting out.

The group’s Pastor, Henry Bennett, together with George White, decided on the name Jubilee from the book of Leviticus in the Bible. Each fiftieth Pentecost was followed by the year of the Jubilee in which all the slaves would be set free. Because most of the members were newly freed slaves the name seemed to fit the group. Indeed, the singers were for the most part emancipated slaves and had confronted social prejudices reflective of the times they were living in. They also faced injustice throughout their early career, being turned away from hotels and waiting rooms, mistreated by the press and certain audiences. They were at times without the money to buy the necessities, but in less than three years through their singing and music they earnt almost one hundred thousand dollars.

Ministers in the places that the Fisk Jubilee Singers performed felt a sense of proprietary interest in their work and enthusiastically promoted them and provided arrangements for their concerts. This is an important point to note in the work of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, that there seemed to be influences from the wider church communities contributing to their music. It goes without saying that the spiritual traditions of the churches were as much a part of their music as the group and University itself. This should be considered when looking more into the music of the Fisk Jubilee Singers.

Black Christians from slavery in the United States brought the hymns and songs with them forged from their horrific experiences, and these songs were sung and brought overseas to Europe. The transmigration and introduction of the music in Europe also garnered even more support and empathy.

In 1874 the Fisk Jubilee Singers were able to visit Europe for the first time and sung for Queen Victoria, giving them further credibility. Despite the busy schedules, the troupe changed members and brought in a singer called Frederick Jeremiah Loudin. On their 1875 tour in Britain, traveling widely through England Scotland and Wales, Loudin commented on the entire absence of racial prejudice. Their impact globally was significant: by the year 1886 the genre of the black spiritual as redefined by the Fisk Jubilee troupe had been firmly established - a group of a dozen men and women with a pianist singing Christian hymns from the perspective of a black American.

The use of melody in the music of the Fisk Jubilee Singers

In a preface to the music in the book The Story of the Jubilee Singers with their Songs by JBT Marsh the writer Theo F. Seward attempts to give a description of the Fisk Jubilee Singers music and in particular draws attention to their melodies.

‘In giving these melodies to the world in a tangible form, it seems desirable to say a few words about them as judged from a musical standpoint. It is certain that the critic stands completely disarmed in their presence. He must not only recognise their immense power over audiences which include many people of the highest culture but if he be not thoroughly encased in prejudice, he must yield a tribute of admiration on his own part and acknowledge that these songs touch a chord which the most consummate art fails to reach.’

The writer also talks about how the comparisons of their former state of slavery intensifies their music, or in other words how their personal experiences also have a huge bearing on the impact of their music in alongside their melodies. Hope is also a strong theme, according to the writer, of race and upliftment which occupies the mind of the listener within their music. Of course, the Fisk Jubilee Singers encapsulate the spirit of the African American at the time; their music presented their unique narrative largely unknown to the audience, but through their songs they had the power to emotionally affect the listener.

A short analysis of the songs of the Fisk Jubilee Singers

Harry Johnston wrote in the book The Story of my Life in 1923 that the melodies were Methodist hymns of the 18^th century of English or French origin. This however takes away from the important quality which is the way these hymns were sung and how they were performed; there was more to this interpretation than simply relating it to musical historical theory. In the Times article entitled ‘Bright Mansions’ published in 1899, there was an interesting description: ‘Negro invention during slavery days was sad wistful, reminders of the land of glory of bright mansions beyond the grave or very materialistic definitions of the patterns from death to life over the river and of the sober joys experienced in paradise.’ This is a very good breakdown of what will be explored further on.

In The Story of the Jubilee Singers with their Songs Theo F. Seward was also one of the first people to try and analyse their music in depth. Their music is out of the ordinary, definitely for the times, and not in line with the music being composed at that time. These are songs that are not taught or tutored. There is a strong sense of community in the case of the Jubilee Singers through the religious services and meetings that influence the music borne again out of the experiences of the African American.

The writer uses the terms such as ‘childlike receptive minds of these unfortunates’ which is dated now. I think what he is getting at is the earlier emotional state and suffering endured by the African American which links into their trauma of slavery and working through the emotional pain channeled through their music. He also mentions the inspiration given most likely through the gift of song by an ever-watchful father. I believe this doesn’t just relate to the leaders of the Church but also to something deeper internally and spiritually - inner resilience, self-belief and a spiritual faith in an Almighty God or ancestors. Perhaps it may be useful to investigate Jungian archetypes which, can also shed an interesting light; in Jungian theory the father archetype represents an authority figure, protector and provider which can also be associated with self-control and empowerment. Jung also sees this archetype present in all individuals. Undergoing the hardships, suffering and oppression present in slavery, I think Jung’s description of the archetype embodies the hopes of the black spiritual. 

The writer also gives an interesting analogy, ‘Quickening the pulse of life to keep them from falling into a hopeless apathy.’ Emotionally this illustrates the healing function of the song’s pulse and rhythm as life giving and preserving; in Freudian theory Thanatos represents the death drive and Eros the Life drive. Thanatos relates to entropy or the idea that systems will eventually reach its lowest point in sharp contrast with the concept of Eros, the spread of life. According to Sigmund Freud these states are in a state of tension. Both states are present at the same time. Freud had done clinical studies on these drives and observed that people who experience trauma or a traumatic event tend to recreate it. People can hold an unconscious wish to die but the desire to live counters that wish. Again, I return to the writer’s analogy and the psychic psychological states that lead to a sense of hope and upliftment present in the music of the black spirituals.

Seward attempts to analyse the technicality of the melodies, again drawing attention to the pulse and rhythm, highlighting the complexities, originality and strangeness of it. The triple time (or three-part measure) according to the writer was rare in the music of the Fisk Jubilee Singers. He relates it to the swaying of the body movement, the tapping of the foot, for dance and music in African traditions are largely inseparable. These movements accompany the singing movements, the body and the song are in syncopation as Seward mentions: ‘Irregularities invariably conform to the higher law of the perfect rhythmic flow.’

Interestingly, Seward notes that almost half of the melodies are written in the same scale as Scottish music, with the seventh and forth tones left out (the Pentatonic scale or mode). Early Greek music is also said to have been written in this scale too, leading him to ponder if it were the language of nature or in an older alphabet than the diatonic scale. These descriptions indicate that the music for the writer may be tapping into the ancient past and all its mystery.

Seward also observes the importance of the chorus, or the refrain sung after the verses, and the importance of this characteristic in hymns. However, I think that it is a way of returning back to and re-centring the song and also both the singer and listener, returning to the idea of memory; the chorus is a part rooted in remembrance perhaps as a way of reminding oneself of the past.

This is encapsulated beautifully in the song ‘Nobody Knows the Trouble I see Lord’: Nobody knows the trouble I see Lord, nobody knows the trouble I see, nobody knows the trouble I see Lord, Nobody knows like Jesus.

'Nobody knows the trouble I see' by the Fisk Jubilee Singers, 1935

It also emphasises repetition, repetitive words and prayer. I like to think of the expression ‘learning prayers by heart,’ - we learn prayers by trying to commit them to memory, we say these prayers over and over and can express these prayers through the heart. We give our hearts to Jesus; we give our love to Jesus.

I also think of the idea of particular experiences and memories being painful, with regards to trauma; suppression is a form of repression as mentioned by Sigmund Freud in 1892. This is the conscious process of pushing unwanted thoughts and memories out of awareness. Much of the trauma experienced in slavery is too much to bear and comprehend or imagine, both the mental and physical pain endured. To try to express these feelings with words alone cannot convey the intensity but music is more able to do this. It is no wonder that the music has such power, the power to articulate emotions buried deep and to bring them out.

I return to what Theodor Reik suggested, the concealed meaning in the melody and the inherent repetition, which is an important component of the music of Black Spirituals, gospel and classical composers who are inspired by and adopt a similar template in their music. In a sense, the music was used to convey and process traumatic emotions, and the healing was through the music itself.

John Bowlby, in the book Attachment first published in 1969, says that we have a human instinct to form attachments with people throughout our life. Bowlby goes on to say that trying to escape grief is akin to denying one’s attachment to that person. In a sense, by doing this we are lying to ourselves and denying reality and so it is very important to be able to accept and go through the process of grief.

In the music of the black spirituals, we see a collective expression of the trauma of slavery that very much incorporates the pain of separation and loss. This goes even further; the loss of self-identity, family and ancestry, culture and religion are all aspects of this grief. In the music of the Fisk Jubilee Singers and the black spirituals this is also unprocessed grief - the singers share together and the listener can identify with. The listener may not understand the context to which the music may come from, but are enraptured with the power of the emotions.

Feelings, as painful as they can be, are released and expressed through the music, and the listener is able to feel the emotional intensity so both musician and audience undergo a process of healing by being more in touch with their emotions and feelings. Jung says that ‘our emotions affect us and happen to us’. The process of ‘individuation’ as Jung described, is a search for wholeness within the human psyche. The process of trying to reach a state of wholeness and making sense of the fragmentation caused by the trauma of slavery, the lost parts of one’s being, is such a strong theme in the melodies of the black spirituals, and in particular the Fisk Jubilee Singers. The melodies centre around a juxtaposition of notes sounding both sadness and joy. Can sadness and joy exist at the same time? Perhaps in the mind of the black spiritual they can coexist, for one can’t exist without the other.

A short conclusion

I’d like to return to the idea of ‘cultural trauma’ - the idea that one’s cultural worldview has been destabilised. Ron Eyerman in his book Cultural Trauma: Slavery and the Formation of the African American Identity explores the formation of the African American identity through the idea of cultural trauma and slavery. He sees the trauma as a collective memory and pervasive remembrance that grounds a person’s sense of itself. I would argue that cultural trauma can be expressed through the arts and, as it occupies the collective memory, the medium of arts are universally expressed through the collective dreams of music, folklore and other mediums.

Music becomes that medium for collective dreaming, for there is something about the music of the black spirituals embodied in the music of Fisk Jubilee Singers that brings about the collective expression of trauma work that not only affects the singer themselves but also the listener. This is music that speaks to us as much as it speaks to them; we can all relate to the experiences from the painful trauma to the joyful sense of overcoming the traumatic experiences through our own personal journeys. There is something in the music that is universal, an ability to remember our humanity.  

A special thank you

I would like to say a big thank you to the British Library, Classical Curator Jonathan Summers, and the other fantastic staff members that I’ve been able to meet on my fellowship at the British Library. It has certainly been a challenging year for the Library but I’ve felt much support throughout my visits. It has been an absolute joy, as well as a remarkable and memorable time.

In 2018 the British Library ran their Windrush Exhibition, Songs from a Strange Land, which featured multiple recordings from the sound archive. To coincide with this the Learning Team designed a digital education programme entitled ‘Walk in their footsteps: Windrush Voices,’ which was later developed into an on-site workshop for Key Stage 4 and 5 students (ages 14 – 18). The workshop critically engaged learners with the British Library’s archival collections and investigated the experiences of Caribbean immigrants coming to England, in the 1950s and then later in the 1960s, through their own personal testimonies. Many of the oral history clips used in these sessions can make for difficult and upsetting listening, as individuals including Vanley Burke and Donald Hinds reflect on their experiences, not least the racism they encountered, following their arrival to the U.K.

Since launching this programme the Learning Team have received many requests for similar resources for Key Stage 2 learners (ages 7 – 11). Schools teaching Windrush and Caribbean migration as part of their local history study had struggled to find authentic and meaningful visits or materials, beyond key texts such as Benjamin Zephaniah’s Windrush Child and Floella Benjamin’s Coming to England. They also felt that upper Key Stage Two learners were ready for more challenging material, including examining racism and the legacies of empire. The Learning Team worked closely with a cohort of teachers on ways to incorporate our oral history clips in meaningful but accessible ways for younger users.

The interior of the Baggage Hall at Tilbury Passenger Landing Stage,  Essex. Image from Alamy.

The central clip selected was of poet and activist Linton Kwesi Johnson reflecting on his experience of arriving in Tilbury Docks from Jamaica in November 1963 as an 11-year-old boy. To promote active listening, we followed a metacognitive approach, helping learners to think explicitly about the processes of learning.  We did this by following a clear step-by-step framework of questions and prompts to create a more authentic encounter between listener and testimony, described as ‘interactive listening,’ which seeks to create a different way of thinking, centring connection over comprehension. 

Before listening to the clip, learners were given a brief amount of contextual information, then asked to consider the following: 

1. Given what you already know, what are you expecting to hear in the interview?

2. What questions might the interviewer ask, and how might the interviewee respond?

While using this method, learners are encouraged to listen carefully not just for content but for the emotion in the speaker’s voice, and how their ideas might be communicated. Learners are told there are no right or wrong answers; rather, they are encouraged to make a connection between their own contextual knowledge and what they might expect to hear. They’re also encouraged to draw on their own experiences: in this example, the learners are all close to Linton’s age when he arrived in the UK, which presents an opportunity for a genuine empathetic connection between listener and interviewee. Feedback from one of the pilot sessions reflected this: 

Children were engaged with the recordings because they had prior knowledge and were allowed to think for themselves. Nothing was a bad idea or spoon-fed to them

The clip is played twice, and learners are asked to consider the following questions:

3. What did you find out, and was it line with what you were expecting?

4. Any surprises and/or omissions?

5. What follow-up questions would you like to have asked? 

In terms of expectations, learners sometimes expect Linton to talk directly about racism, thinking that this will be a central feature of his experiences. This is an opportunity to point out that the focus of the clip is his initial arrival, rather than areas of life where he might be more exposed to racism, such as at school or work. This can lead onto a discussion about Linton seeing the world through a child’s lens and the extent to which he might have limited understanding of the wider context, compared to his mother’s greater awareness and ability to make sense of her surroundings and experiences. It also provides a good opportunity to point out that this clip is one fragment of a much longer life story and that in other extracts Linton does discuss the racism and discrimination he faces. 

Linton Kwesi Johnson in concert in Brussels October 28, 2017. Image by Peter Verwimp.

In response to the fourth question, learners are often surprised by Linton’s response to the interviewer’s question about how long it had been since he’d last since his mother: 

It seemed like a long time, but I don’t think it was more than two years. But it seemed like a very long time.

We discuss ideas of separation and how that might have felt, why Linton seemingly plays down the length of time he was apart from his mother, as well as how separation of families is a central theme in migration stories. This links to the final question and the kind of questions that learners generate. The following emerged as questions learners would have liked to have asked Linton:

- ‘What was it like seeing your mother again?’

- ‘Who looked after you when your Mum was in England?’

- ‘Where was your Dad?’, and 

- ‘Did you wish you could go back to Jamaica?’ 

These questions all reflect empathy and active engagement with the listening exercise. Regardless of whether they can get answers to their questions, learners are demonstrating agency through their involvement in the process, rather than being passive recipients of information. This demonstrates how using oral history in the classroom doesn’t necessarily need to equate with learners carrying out their own interviews; rather, the exercise can form part of a richer learning experience in and of itself. This has been reflected in the feedback:

The children loved hearing real voices and spoke about how it helped them understand history and bring it to life more – sometimes it doesn’t feel real!

In March 2024, the first Windrush Primary workshop ran at the British Library, which focused on Caribbean migration more broadly. This coincided with new documents becoming available in the Treasures gallery, including a 1964 letter from James Berry’s archive, a 1961 pamphlet published by the BBC Caribbean Service from Andrew Salkey’s archive, and a photo story from the first edition of Flamingo magazine, also from 1961. These artefacts provide a fantastic opportunity for learners to work like historians, handling archival material and using it to challenge or corroborate their evidence. This has been particularly effective in relation to Linton's clip and the letter from James Berry’s son Roger, both demonstrating how stories of migration are often underpinned with separation from loved ones, and the myriad challenges this brings.

It has been wonderful to bring clips from the sound archive to a younger audience and see first-hand how learners can engage with oral history in a meaningful way. As for next steps, the primary workshop is already adapting to meet the demands of secondary teachers keen to bring their Key Stage 3 (ages 11 – 14) learners to the Library, which will bring opportunities to source different clips that will speak to, and reflect, the experiences of this age group. We are also keen to develop links with teachers and help support the use of oral history and follow-up activities in their own classrooms, including creating short documentaries and podcasts based on their experiences with the British Library’s sound archive.

Thank you to the schools involved in the pilot: Jodi-Ann Forbes and her learners at Woodpecker Hall Academy, Enfield; Sam Nelson and her learners at Christchurch Primary School, Essex; Chloe Sutherland and her learners at St Peter and St Paul Church Primary, Surrey; Louise Hall and Louise Archer and their learners at Holy Trinity and St Silas Primary, Camden. Additional thanks to Mary Stewart (Lead Curator of Oral History) and the Learning Team at the BL.

For more details on how this metacognitive approach is being used in the classroom, read https://www.ohs.org.uk/general-interest/authentic-encounters-oral-history-in-the-classroom/

Blog by Debbie Bogard, Learning Facilitator in the British Library's Learning team.

 

Introduction

Part 3 of a guest blog by Andrew O. Krastins. 

Part 1 can be found here.  Part 2 can be found here.

In the last two parts of this blog, the reader learned how the Mystery Cylinders traveled from their unknown point of origin to the desk of a London music publishing executive who died in 1929, then, around 1965, into a refuse bin from which they were rescued in the nick of time, then to the home of the employee who rescued them, and, finally, to the British Library. Readers learned why the British Library’s provisional attribution of the cylinders to August Wilhelmj is no longer plausible.  The author urged, but has yet to demonstrate, that Sivori recorded at least some of the cylinders at the end of his life, perhaps days before his death.  In part 2, readers met Sivori himself and, all too briefly, followed the career of this great Romantic virtuoso, who, it turns out, was a supremely well-rounded musician, lover of chamber music and devotee of Beethoven, utterly devoted to the violin, even in his 70s, playing his scales and improvising every day in his modest Paris hotel room or equally modest Genoa apartment, and frequently performing with friends in Paris and Genoa.  Now we come to the most convoluted part of our adventure. In the early 1890s, almost all of the very few phonographs then in Europe were tightly controlled by the London-based Edison United Phonograph Company, overseen by Edison’s wayward agent, Colonel George Gouraud.  There is no evidence that Sivori visited England during the early 1890s. Because phonographs were extremely rare in Continental Europe, placing the Phonograph and Sivori in the same place at the same time is no simple venture. Sivori died on February 19, 1894. From September 1893 up to his death, his health fluctuated widely.  Unless Sivori had access to a phonograph while he was still capable of performing, he could not possibly have recorded the Mystery Cylinders.  The reader is in for a rather strenuous uphill hike over some slippery ground through tangles of arcane minutiae. 

A view from the Cemetery    

High in the hills above the tangled passageways of Genoa’s Old Town sits the Staglieno Monumental Cemetery, the final resting place of Genoa’s elite, its heroes, intellectuals and artists, and those merchants and bankers wealthy enough to adorn their tombs with monuments crafted by Genoa’s finest sculptors.  At the cemetery’s center is its 'Pantheon' built in the style of a classical Greek temple and reserved for the remains of Genoa’s most illustrious personages.  Beyond the Pantheon, winding paths of broken stone steps, eaten away by lichen, lead upward, past monuments in varying states of decay, to a small, gated yard at the top of the cemetery, reserved for Genoese heroes of the Risorgimento who in 1860 fought beside Garibaldi in the 'Expedition of a Thousand' to unify Italy and free it of foreign occupiers. Here, many of the monuments are now toppled and broken, the gravestones themselves buried beneath thick masses of leaves and dirt, the buried heroes long forgotten.

Staglieno cemetery

In the early afternoon of February 20, 1894, crowds of mourners began to gather in front of 15 Via Giulia, where Sivori’s body lay in a closed coffin. An hour before the procession to the Pantheon of the Staglieno Cemetery was to begin, the street swelled with mourners, including the foremost families of Genoa and representatives of Genoa’s musical and civic institutions and admirers of all classes.

Pantheon at Staglieno cemetery

Sivori’s relatives hoisted the coffin onto the carriage, which proceeded to the Pantheon, where Sivori’s body was laid to rest.  Contemporary accounts portray a ceremony as solemn and elaborate as a state funeral.¹

Sivori’s grave

In the area reserved for Garibaldi’s ‘Thousand’ is the grave of Enrico Copello.  It is not easy to find, the stone monument long broken, and the gravestone itself buried beneath dirt and leaves. To locate Copello’s grave requires some guesswork, digging and sweeping away inches of debris covering the tombstone which lays flat on the ground.  Copello’s death seems to have attracted little attention.  A few American papers reported his death in early April 1920, perhaps because he was a longtime resident of New York.  But in Genoa, where he was born into a wealthy and prominent family in 1844, his death seems to have passed largely unnoticed.  The Dizionario del Risorgimento Nazionale, published in 1930, misstates the year of his birth and provides no year of death, suggesting he was still living. Even his tombstone misstates his year of death as 1925 rather than 1920.  No one has seen fit to correct it, if it has been noticed at all.

Copello’s grave

Descending from the Staglieno Cemetery back into Genoa proper, there are several places of note, not palaces or monuments to Columbus, but more obscure places which play a central role in our story.  The first is the Sala Sivori, a concert hall built in honor of Sivori in 1869 by Sivori’s friend and admirer Giuseppe Bossola, the piano and musical instrument merchant and music publisher.

Around the corner, at 14 Via Roma, was Bossola’s music store, a gathering place of Genoa’s musicians.  The young composer Niccolo Massa lived a few steps away; the pianist and conductor Leonardo Monleone less than 200 meters.  Reporters from the offices of Il Caffaro, edited by Sivori’s friend Ferdinando Resasco, could walk to the Sala Sivori in little over five minutes.  Behind the walls of Genoa’s narrow streets and in the hills to the east are the villas and mansions of Genoa’s social elite.

A bit south, and overlooking the harbor, was the mansion of Selene Gavino Hofer – a medieval church transformed into a magnificent castle by her fabulously wealthy cousin, Raffaele Rubattino, a shipping magnate. Upon Rubattino’s death in 1881, his entire fortune passed, via Selene, to her husband, Rodolfo Hofer, a prominent Swiss-Italian banker who had been Rubattino’s business partner.  Widowed by Rodolfo’s untimely death in 1886, the entire fortune passed to Selene, a prominent salonnière and amateur pianist at whose home Sivori often performed.  Their friendship dated back to at least the 1860s. Sivori’s performances at Selene’s grand residence were reported in the local press.

Two figures in the shadows

And now we venture into that dark and as yet uncharted historical murk promised in our first installment, that is, an investigation into early sound recording in France and Italy before the rise of European commercial recording in the late 1890s.  General histories of sound recording, biographies of Edison and Eiffel, and popular histories of ‘La Belle Epoque’ together tell a broad but incomplete story.  Readers of such works learn that the phonograph arrived in London in 1888 via Edison’s self-aggrandizing and voluble agent, Colonel George Gouraud, and that Gouraud was convinced that the best use of the device was to collect recordings of eminent worthies praising Edison and Gouraud, and to travel about Britain displaying the device to the paying public. 

A.M.Broadley Introduces Colonel Gouraud 1888

Edison, by contrast, initially believed that the highest use of the Phonograph was as a business machine for office dictation and court reporting. 

Readers of such literature will also learn that the phonograph was introduced to continental Europe at the Paris World’s Fair in 1889, where it created a sensation, but that there was no sound recording of note in Europe before the Pathé brothers founded the French recording industry in the late 1890s, or before similar enterprises arose in other European countries in the late 1890s and early 1900s.  The primary interest of scholars and collectors has been the history of the commercial recording industry as it played out in various countries. Private recordings predating the rise of the commercial phonograph industry are exceedingly rare, and as here, can be fiendishly difficulty to identify.  Also, their relation to the rise of the commercial recording industry is limited.  Hence their general neglect.

Obsessively attentive readers of these secondary sources might notice two names mentioned only in passing: Enrico Copello whose grave we visited five paragraphs back, and Emile Durer.  Durer, it seems, was a Parisian journalist who wrote a short biography of Edison in conjunction with the 1889 Paris World’s Fair.

The phonograph at Paris 1889 Exposition

According to such accounts, that is where his significance ends.  In reality, however, Durer was a well-connected young Hungarian Jewish former diplomat and an extremely enterprising international musical impresario who traveled in the highest social, cultural and musical echelons in the countries where he was active.  Durer was fluent in at least five languages, translating Italian librettos into French, authoring an 1895 novel in German about Parisian life, composing opera libretti in Italian and writing freely in English.  Durer arrived in America in 1888, not primarily as a journalist but as the agent of the Hungarian tenor Jules Perotti, who made his United States debut on November 28, 1888. 

Émile Dürer in 1892

 This was more than six months before the opening of the Paris World’s Fair on May 5, 1889.²

According to the Musical Courier’s January 9, 1889 profile, Durer was born in Budapest in 1859, and was already famous in Europe and South America as an impresario, journalist and publisher.  Durer also served as an Austrian and French diplomat, and upon urging of the French statesman Leon Gambetta, settled in Paris.  After Gambetta’s death in 1882, Durer became an impresario and opera director while continuing to write articles for various journals.  As agent, Durer made a concert tour of Europe with the French baritone Jean LaSalle.  In 1887, Durer commenced a ‘grand operatic tournée through South America’ culminating in the first South American performances of Wagner operas in Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires and Montevideo.³ 

During Durer’s American tour as a musical impresario, he established his personal connection to Edison.  In a March 19, 1889 telegram which Durer sent to Edison from the steamer Allen, Durer wrote: ‘Many thanks for splendid reception. You shall be satisfied from me compliments.’⁴ He signed the telegram ‘Editor Emile Durer,’ presumably while en route back to Paris.

On June 12, 1889, five weeks after the Paris World’s Fair opened, Princess Mathilde Bonaparte hosted one of her salons.  The memoirist Edmond de Goncourt recalled: ‘This evening, at the princess’, one makes me say a sentence into a phonograph, and the sentence that I say, the magic instrument repeats it in my ear, the repetition in the ears of the princess, Lavoix etc.’  Edison’s chief recording expert, Theodore Wangemann, did not leave New York for Paris until June 15, 1889, so he could not have been present.  Edison did not arrive in Paris until August 12, 1889.  Because Princess Mathilde’s salon was frequented by the greatest creative minds of Paris, it is unfortunate that the online Edison papers now available contain no reference to Princess Mathilde or to the June 12, 1889 demonstration.  Although it is unclear who organized the demonstration for Princess Mathilde and her guests, the only person presently known with the social connections and skill to do so was the enterprising Durer, who relied on the phonograph to publicize his musical celebrities in the years after the 1889 World’s Fair, most notably for our purposes, in Italy in 1892.

Cavaliere Copello and the strange career of the Phonograph in Italy

Copello, if he is mentioned at all, appears as an emissary from King Umberto at an elegant gathering held in Edison’s honor, and conveys upon Edison an Italian royal title tantamount to a knighthood.  In those English-language histories where he does appear, he typically is portrayed as an overly animated, gesticulating comical Italian, gibbering at a bemused Edison to the amusement of the other guests – a caricature resembling ugly stock ethnic stereotypes straight from the Victorian music hall stage or xenophobic editorial cartoons.  But to understand the Mystery Cylinders, his story, convoluted as it is, must be told and understood.

Copello, at least according to his tombstone, was born on 11 January 1844.  Born to a wealthy Genoese family, Copello received an elite education in Switzerland.  His father was an entrepreneur, dealing in military supplies and other government goods with offices in several Italian cities.  Copello’s father sent Copello, at age 15, to Milan to assist in the firm’s business.  There, Copello volunteered for Garibaldi’s army.  Copello’s father possessed a fortune of between five and six million lire and appears to have helped fund Garibaldi’s campaigns at Copello’s request.  According to the Dizionario del Risorgimento Nazionale, from which these facts are drawn, from 1866 through 1868, Copello traveled in Africa, Asia and the United States, where he settled in New York City, importing and brokering citrus fruits, marble and other Italian products.                                                                                               

By 1875, Copello had formed a connection with the Society of the Army of the Cumberland, a benevolent society for veterans of one of the principal Union armies in the American Civil War.  On August 13, 1875, Copello wrote a letter declining an invitation to the Society’s Ninth Annual Reunion in Utica, New York.⁵  Copello’s letter shows his full command of English, that Copello was already known among high ranking American military officials as a captain on Garibaldi’s staff, and that he was already so involved in business in New York City that he had to decline an invitation to a prestigious event.  In 1876, Copello married an American, Alice Copello, who became a teacher of foreign languages.⁶  According to the 1900 United States Census for New York, by 1888, the Copellos were raising four children.  By no later than 1880 Copello also maintained a residence in Florence, Italy, apparently the Italian base for his New York import business.⁷

By no later than the Spring of 1889, Copello became personally acquainted with Edison.  The two entered into some sort of arrangement through which Copello understood he had purchased the rights to market the phonograph in Italy.  Copello sailed with his family for Europe with ambitious plans which he quickly put into action.  Prior to arriving in Italy, Copello stopped in London and received two phonographs from Gouraud.⁸ ‘Two phono-graphs are in Italy loaned to a friend of Colonel's, a Mr. Copello to the encouragement of raising a company, but used up to date principally for exhibitional purposes to the public,’ reported Edison’s chief technical expert on the phonograph, Hugh de Coursey Hamilton.  Prior to June 27, 1889, Copello and Gouraud arranged for an Italian Charge´ d’Affaires to record a message to Italian Prime Minister Francesco Crispi.  The Bristol Mercury reported on 6 July 1889:

The first practical use of the phonograph in diplomatic correspondence occurred on Friday, and to Italy’s representative at the court of St. James belongs the honor of this innovation.  Commendatore Catalani, Chargé d’Affaires, preceded his private communication, which was addressed to Signor Crispi in the following way:– ‘Through the kind thoughtfulness of Col. Gouraud, Edison’s colleague, and the patriotic idea of Cavalier Copello, it was decided that the first phonogram sent from England to Italy today (June 27^th,1889) should transmit the voice of the Chargé d’Affaires of Italy in London, addressed to his Excellence the Honourable Crispi, President of the Council (Premiere) and Minister of Foreign Affairs.  Thanks to the genius of Edison, as in fairy tales, my voice as my wish will bear wings. From the shores of the Thames . . . it will cross the sea, voyage through France, pierce the Alps, run through Piedmont, Liguria and Tuscany, until it is heard on the shores of the Tiber. . . . Since the sound of the human voice, in itself a light and passing thing, may be indefinitely treasured, right are those who pronounce the human soul immortal, for it is necessary to be immortal to have the power of rendering imperishable such a quickly fleeting thing.

Cavalier Copello (uno dei mille), one of ‘Garibaldi’s famous thousand,’ is the bearer of these unique dispatches.’

Copello told his Italian audiences that the beginning of Copello’s actual work on behalf of the phonograph in Italy began on July 4, 1889, which he noted was American Independence Day.  Thus it appears that Copello arrived in London around July 4, 1889 to pick up the two phonographs and the diplomatic phonogram from Catalani to Crispi.  This also means he was already working directly with Gouraud.

In mid-July 1889, Copello went to Rome and demonstrated the phonograph before the Italian Chamber of Deputies.  On July 15, 1889, Copello demonstrated the phonograph to King Umberto.  The King recorded a congratulatory message to Edison for Copello to present to the inventor in Paris.  King Umberto also conveyed upon Edison the title of grande ufficiale della Corona d'Italia, or Grand Officer of the Crown of Italy, a signal honor in the newly unified Italian nation.  On July 29, 1889, Charles H. Wood, the United States Vice Consul General to Rome, reported to the State Department that 'Signor Enrico Copello, who formerly resided many years in the United States, has purchased the rights to sell the Edison phonograph in Italy.'

According to news reports: ‘As a preliminary step to this enterprise, the Consul reports that Signor Copello visited Rome, bringing with him the first phonograph ever seen in the kingdom.  It was exhibited before representatives of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, leading scientists and King Umberto. The King dictated a congratulatory message to the phonograph to the inventor and requested Signor Copello to carry to Queen Margaret at Venice a phonograph message.  The invention awakened great interest throughout the country, the Vice Consul says, and the columns of the press are filled with handsome tributes to Mr. Edison and to the inventive genius of the American people generally.’⁹ This article, or versions of it, appeared in newspapers throughout the United States.

Copello established his phonograph headquarters in Florence where he already had a business presence, hired employees and embarked on a series of exhibitions throughout Italy. Also headquartered in Florence was Edison’s longtime friend, the fabulously wealthy Egisto P. Fabbri, an Italian shipping magnate and investment banker who made his fortune in the United States, was a business partner of the Gilded Age financier J. P. Morgan and was instrumental in expanding Edison’s electrical lighting business into Italy and elsewhere in Europe.¹⁰ The Fabbris were devoted to music.  Egisto was a talented cellist who played at a professional level.¹¹ His nephew, whom he adopted at an early age, was an equally devoted violinist, before settling on painting and architecture.  Fabbri was also one of the founders of the New York Metropolitan Opera.  Musical evenings were commonplace in Fabbri’s Florence mansion at 82 Via Cavour.¹²

Copello did not simply sail to Italy with his phonograph, hoist it onto a gaudily painted traveling medicine-show wagon and haul it from town to town, barking out the Italian equivalent of ‘step right up.’  From Italian news reports, correspondence from Edison’s chief London recording expert and other sources, a general outline can be drawn.  Gouraud loaned Copello two phonographs for the purpose ‘of raising a company, but used up to date principally for exhibitional purposes.’¹³ Copello first sailed to London to pick up the phonographs and the Catalani cylinder.  According to Genoese 1889 news reports, Copello was accompanied by 'a young and skillful English engineer' who was probably supplied by Gouraud while Copello was in London.                    

Copello’s first major demonstration was before King Umberto, which certainly required much advance diplomatic and logistical planning.  This suggests that Copello also was assisted by his Florentine neighbor Fabbri, who had a long-standing connection with the marketing of Edison’s Italian electrical operations in Italy and the requisite Italian political and social connections.  A circular which Copello distributed at his demonstrations set out a marketing plan, which was substantially identical to that of Edison himself.  The phonograph would be distributed through local agencies, which would lease rather than sell them outright, at a rate of 10 to 15 lira per month.¹⁴ Copello’s Italian phonograph enterprise was planned out in detail, with the knowledge and collaboration of both Edison and Gouraud.

As a highly cultured Italian, Copello’s ideas of what was worth recording differed from Gouraud’s. From the outset, Copello’s tastes seemed more aligned with those of his Florence neighbor Fabbri.  In late July or early August 1889, at the very outset of his efforts in Italy, Copello recorded the great operatic baritone Giuseppe Kaschmann at the peak of his career. This was widely reported in Italy, France and the United States.¹⁵  He also had already recorded Belletti, identified in Il Caffaro as a baritone from Bologna, performing an aria from L’Africaine by Meyerbeer, as well as a vast repertoire of other recordings demonstrating the value and versatility of the phonograph.¹⁶  Armed with his newly made recording of King Umberto, and Edison’s medal, Copello departed for Paris, where Edison himself arrived on August 12, 1889.¹⁷   Copello had no way of knowing that tensions already festered between Gouraud and Edison.                       

The Paris World’s Fair opened on May 5, 1889.  Edison’s exhibits included all of his major inventions and occupied a large portion of the American industrial and scientific exhibits at the Fair.  In early 1889, Edison’s chief laboratory assistant, the engineer William J. Hammer, was in Paris, charged with setting up and overseeing Edison’s exhibits.  Gouraud, meantime, at least in Edison’s view, attempted to wheedle his way into controlling the phonograph exhibit for his own profit through publicity and by charging admission in a special building erected for the purpose outside of the main Fair grounds. Edison was enraged.  On April 8, 1889, Edison wrote to Gouraud: ‘Phonographs can be exhibited to full advantage in the space allotted to all my inventions.  Ear tubes exclude all outside noise.  Refuse absolutely to charging entrance fees or the introduction of any side show or Barnum methods at Paris.’¹⁸

Four days later, Edison sent a follow-up:

Under cover of exciting public interest in the phonograph you have adopted a plan which retards the progress of real business and keeps the instrument before people as a curiosity with which they may make themselves familiar for a slight consideration, and so long as this preliminary system continues to pay, it appears to be your intention to sustain it.  Nothing of the kind was contemplated when I consented to you handling the business.  I believed that you would pursue genuine business methods and never dreamed that you would side-track the whole enterprise for the purpose of gaining time to indulge in a series of picayune side-shows which do far more harm to your real interests than can ever be compensated for by the temporary gain which they ensure.

The ‘general effect’ of Gouraud’s methods 'savors too much of the style of enterprise peculiar to a certain class of phrenologists and ventriloquists,’ Edison wrote.  ‘You have simply let your desire to make quick money run away with your better judgment.’¹⁹ On April 19, 1889, Edison telegraphed to Hammer: ‘Take absolutely no instruction as to the phonograph exhibit except from me.  Make no arrangement with Gouraud about sharing expenses. Pavilion must not cost more than three thousand.  Intend exhibit shall be my own, at my own expense, and under my control.  Edison.’²⁰   The Paris World’s Fair proved a triumph for Edison and his inventions, but the day-to-day operations of the phonograph exhibit were, from the outset, suffused with personal and professional tension which fermented into outright animosity between competing businessmen. 

Upon Edison’s arrival in Paris, he was met by a crowd of dignitaries and European Edison operatives, including Emile Durer.  Edison and his family took rooms at the luxurious Hotel du Rhin. On August 14, 1889, Edison sent Gouraud a telegram: ‘Understanding you agreed my proposal will be Paris Friday Morning Please secure room your hotel order crown of Italy Grade great Officer as telegraphed Figaro Copello.’²¹ The same day, Le Figaro published a front page article on Edison which included the following: ‘The King of Italy has just appointed Edison a grand officer of the Order of the Crown of Italy. Cavaliere Copello is charged with presenting the insignias.’²² From Paris, Edison sent a courtly and grateful reply to the King.²³  The presentation had been carefully choreographed by Copello, Gouraud and Edison himself.

Copello arrived in Paris on August 16, 1889.²⁴  On August 17, 1889, Edison hosted a morning reception attended by a crowd of dignitaries, journalists and business acquaintances, including Durer, Gouraud and the English journalist Robert Sherard, Paris correspondent for the Pall Mall Gazette.²⁵ In addition to the honors from King Umberto to Edison, Copello carried with him a sturdy wooden box, like a small rustic treasure chest, which he presented either to Gouraud or to Edison himself.  The box contains the cylinder on which King Umberto recorded his greeting to Edison in Rome on July 15, 1888.  Gouraud added it to his growing library of recorded flattering greetings from international and local celebrities.  It was the first of Copello’s cylinders to be delivered to the London branch of Edison’s Phonograph operations.

King of Italy cylinder box lid

At some point during his time in Paris, Copello presented to Edison the insignia of the Grand Officer of the Crown of Italy along with a letter on behalf of King Umberto and Queen Margherita.  The August 17, 1889 edition of Le Figaro reported on the front page: 

Cavaliere Copello arrived yesterday in Paris bringing Edison, from the King of Italy, the insignia of a grand officer of the order of the Crown . . . . Edison warmly thanked Cavaliere Copello and invited him to lunch at the Eiffel Tower.  At dessert, Mr. Copello drank to the health of Mrs. Edison and that of her illustrious husband.  Edison, in thanking him, was kind enough, in an eloquent toast, to recall that Le Figaro ‘had been the first to welcome him to this French soil . . . . Colonel Gouraud, Mr. Emile Durer, Mr. Scherard (sic), from the Pall Mall Gazette, then took the floor and finished the series of toasts.  A good day of which Edison will have excellent memories.       

Sherard reported in the August 19, 1889 Pall Mall Gazette that when he arrived at Edison’s hotel, and was shown into Edison’s elegant drawing room. ‘Edison was standing by the mantelpiece. At a secretaire by the window were Colonel Gouraud, Mr. Durer, and others.’ Mrs. Edison was at the other end of the room. In Sherard’s telling, while talking to Edison, 'one came up who was enthusiastic, and who "spoke in the name of humanity" to the "King of Science," and was verbose and gesticulative.  I think anyone who has seen Edison face to face with a Bore must love him for all his days. He has the sweetest smile and gives apparent attention, which is the courtesy of conversation.'

While Edison was indulging ‘the Bore,’ Gouraud pointed out Copello talking to Mrs. Edison at the other end of the room and said that King Umberto had sent Copello on a special mission to present the honorary insignia to Edison.  Sherard observed: ‘I could not help wishing that a few representatives of European flunkeydom could have seen Edison, when in pleasantry one addressed him as "Count."  His laugh then was worth all the revolutions that were ever made by democracy against the aforesaid flunkeydom.’  Sherard reported that he lunched with the Edisons, Copello, Durer and Gouraud at ‘chez Brebant, on the Eiffel Tower.’ 

The strange disappearance of Enrico Copello

If Copello played such a central role in the early history of the phonograph in Europe, how is it that virtually nobody has heard of him, even academic experts in the field?  The answer is exasperating.  In his 1906 memoir, Sherard hammered out a revised version of the Edison reception that is as ugly as it is enduring and as enduring as it is false:

When I was ushered into the room, I saw the master standing by the mantlepiece listening to an excitable little man who was dressed in the height of fashion and who was waving a box in his hand which looked like a jewel case. He was speaking, so I heard, ‘in the name of humanity.’ He was . . . most verbose and gesticulative . . . . I liked Edison before I had met him for his delightful attitude face to face with this bore.  His face wore the sweetest and kindest of smiles, and he was apparently giving his entire attention to the man. I heard afterwards, however, that at such times, a certain deafness aiding, he is able to fix his thoughts elsewhere.

Colonel Gouraud . . . who was present amongst the other people in the drawing room . . drew me aside and said, ‘I may tell you something which Mr. Edison would never tell you.  That gentleman who is talking to him is the Cavaliere Copello.  He has just come to Paris on a special mission from the King of Italy to Mr. Edison, bringing him the insignia of Grand Officer of the Crown of Italy.

‘Say, Gouraud,’ cried Edison, ‘let me see the letter that came along with the insignia. . . . [Sherard paraphrases the congratulatory letter] ‘This order confirms upon you, sir, the title of count,' said the Cavaliere Copello. 'and on you madame,' he added, turning and bowing to Mrs. Edison, 'the title of countess.’

I wished that a few representatives of European flunkeydom could have seen Edison’s face when this announcement was made to him by the little Cavaliere.  He actually laughed, much to Signor Copello’s astonishment, and not a little to his confusion.  

In Sherard’s 1906 version, Sherard falsified Copello’s role purely for comic effect, demeaning Copello and trivializing his role.  Sherard obviously consulted his own 1889 version and decided to make Copello ‘the Bore’ who had accosted Edison in the earlier version when, in reality, Copello had been at the opposite end of the room.  As a seasoned journalist fluent in French, Sherard necessarily knew that Copello was not a representative of 'European flunkeydom' whose only role was as emissary of the Italian King, but Edison’s agent for the phonograph in Italy because it was so reported in the Paris press, and because he dined with Edison, Copello, Durer and Gouraud in the Eiffel Tower’s Brebant restaurant after the reception at Edison’s hotel.

Sherard’s 1906 version was taken up by writers on the early history of the phonograph, Belle Epoque Paris, and other subjects.  Jill Jonnes’ immensely popular and well-received 2009 book, Eiffel’s Tower and the World’s Fair Where Buffalo Bill Beguiled Paris, and Thomas Edison Became a Count, repeats Sherard’s account verbatim and unquestioned, including the ‘excitable little man who was dressed in the height of fashion and who was waiving a box in his hand’ who was ‘most verbose and gesticulative,’ specifically including the event in the book’s title, presumably for comic effect.  A recent biographer of Gouraud adds, incorrectly, that Copello spoke no English.

The most recent appearance of Sherard’s 1906 fabrication is in a 2023 biography of Mina Miller Edison, Edison’s wife.²⁶ Here too, the author presents Copello as nothing more than a pretentious emissary from a European king, the type of person for whom Edison had no patience. The work gives no indication that Copello had already recorded King Umberto and was conducting demonstrations throughout Italy on Edison’s behalf.  The author adds: ‘However, Edison’s snicker flabbergasted Cavaliere Copello.  Conscious that he was insulted, Mina remedied the situation and hosted the entire party for a celebratory luncheon at one of Paris’ finest restaurants.’  There is no citation for this particular information and no mention of it in Mina Edison’s surviving letters in the online Edison archives.  Its source was Sherard, as the author subsequently confirmed.

The greatest significance of Sherard’s 1906 fabrication is not that it unfairly made Edison look bad.  Edison and Gouraud did indeed treat Copello badly.  Rather, Sherard’s fib continues to obscure crucial facts about the history of the phonograph in Europe. Readers of these three sources would have no reason to suspect that Copello was anything more than a silly and historically inconsequential character whose importance begins and ends with the narrow comic role imposed on him.  Readers would have no reason to suspect that Copello worked with Edison and Gouraud directly, that all three had carefully choreographed publicizing the award Edison received from the King, and, crucially, that Copello was Edison’s agent for the phonograph in Italy where Copello made dozens and perhaps hundreds of important historical recordings.

So why has this caricature persisted while Copello’s actual role remains obscure?  And persisted notwithstanding Sherard’s obvious ethnic stereotyping purely for ridicule? Sherard was a well-connected ‘literary’ journalist whose 1906 memoir provides a funny and useful little anecdote which is more writer-friendly and easier to find than messy facts contained in actual 1889 newspapers and boring business correspondence. In Jonnes’s book, it is used to contrast unpretentious American knowhow with outdated European silliness. The Mina Miller Edison biography employs it to show Mina’s ability to salve over social embarrassments caused by Edison’s brusque manners. And so it persists, calcifying into 'common knowledge' with each repetition. 

The Phonograph’s debut in Genoa

Copello returned to Italy almost immediately after the August 19, 1889 reception and luncheon.²⁷ On August 22, 1889, Il Caffaro announced the Phonograph’s arrival in Genoa, with Copello as Edison’s Italian representative.  According to the accounts in Il Cittadino, Copello was accompanied by a ‘young and skillful English engineer,’ and played a recording of a message from Italy’s charge d’affaires in London.  All this, in conjunction with Gouraud’s receipt of the King Umberto cylinder, suggests that Copello was working directly with Gouraud as well as Edison and had traveled to London. 

Phonograph demonstrations took place at the Carlo Felice Theatre, the Sala Sivori and the Tursi Palace.²⁸  ‘The voice of the absent, of the distant, the dead, the most fleeting and sudden musical inspiration, all without the hindrance of time or distance, is captured and reproduced a thousand miles away after tens, twenties, or thirty years, not only with clarity and precision, but preserving the sound's characteristic character, reproducing even the acoustic environment,’ Copello told his audience at the Tursi Palace.

From Copello’s presentations and from the circular which he distributed, Copello’s Genoese auditors learned that Edison’s operations had gained control of the phonograph ‘throughout the civilized world.’  The machines would be leased to local agencies for 10 to 15 lira per month, and the cost of communicating by cylinder would ultimately be extremely cheap because cylinders could be reused, as opposed to paper which was discarded after a single use.

Throughout July and August 1889, Copello’s role as Edison’s agent for the phonograph in Italy, and purchaser of the Italian rights, was widely reported in the American, British and Italian press. There is nothing in the Edison online archive indicating that Edison, directly or indirectly, contradicted these reports, publicly or privately.  We have documented that Edison and Gouraud participated directly in Copello’s venture.  Nonetheless, several months before January 1, 1890, Edison, Gouraud and their many lawyers began negotiating the creation of a new company.  Through a series of interrelated contracts, the parties formed the Edison United Phonograph Company.

The gist of the arrangement was as follows.  Edison United would have the exclusive rights to the commercial exploitation of the phonograph in Europe and elsewhere outside the United States with the exception of Canada. The new company would be managed by Gouraud in London.  Edison himself would have no further involvement in the marketing of the phonograph outside the United States and Canada.  In exchange, Edison United would be obligated to buy all its sound reproduction devices, cylinders and supplies exclusively from Edison’s factories in the United States. 

Edison, at the time, believed that the most lucrative way to market the phonograph was by leasing phonographs to third parties, whether for business or entertainment purposes, and later outright sale.  Gouraud, however, jealously stuck to his notion of touring phonograph demonstrations under the control of Gouraud himself.  Neither Edison nor Gouraud nor anyone else appears to have advised Copello of this new arrangement or what it meant for Copello’s established operations in Italy. 

            On December 28, 1889, Copello sent Edison a letter suffused with anxiety:

My Dear Edison; 

Though I have been anxiously looking for some communication from you during all these months, as you led me to hope, I am still without any word from you.  I hope you have not quite forgotten the friend who had the honor of taking to you the token of the high appreciation of the King of Italy. I am also happy to have been the means of conveying to you a silver medal which my friend the Mayor of Como--the birthplace of Volta--tendered to you in the name of the city magistrates and which I delivered to the American Minister in Rome, last week, to be forwarded to you.  These facts show simply that I have done something, and not without good results, toward making your latest invention properly appreciated in this country, and toward laying the foundation for a large business which I hope will soon be entered upon and for which I trust I shall have your moral support and the help of your authority, in closing with the London House. I should not have considered the year well ended without sending to you and to my lady Edison, my warmest wishes for your joint happiness for the coming twelve months and many more to follow, as you both desire.  Hoping to have the pleasure of hearing from you soon, I remain Your Devoted Servant and Friend, E Copello.’²⁹

Edison delegated the response to his private secretary, Alfred Ord Tate:

My Dear Mr. Copello, -

I have received your letter of 28^th ultimo, enclosing a communication to Mr. Edison, which he has read, and he asked me to write and explain to you the condition of affairs in respect to the phonograph. Col. Gouraud is at the present time in America, where a large Company has been formed to handle all the foreign business, and in view of this arrangement, negotiations in connection with which were started several months ago in London, Colonel Gouraud has been actually unable to make any definite arrangements as to the disposition of the territory in Europe, which I presume is what you refer to in your letter.  When this Company is ready for active business, Col. Gouraud will be in a position to act more definitely than he has yet been able to do; and although it is unnecessary to remind him of the interest which you take in the business, and your desire for a closer connection therewith, as he has a full appreciation of it now, we will communicate with him and do all to assist you.³⁰

In the Spring of 1890, a Thomas Childs, apparently an attorney then in Florence, wrote to Edison on behalf of Copello.  On May 5, 1890, Edison’s secretary responded:

The details of the phonograph business in Europe have never been in Mr. Edison's hands, Col. Gouraud having had sole charge of them. Mr. Edison is not familiar with all that has been done by Col. Gouraud in connection with the phonograph abroad, and he has referred your communication to the New York Office of the Edison United Phonograph Company, the newly formed corporation which controls the instrument in Europe. Mr. Edison appreciates very highly the personal attention shown him while in Europe by Mr. Copello, and he trusts that the United Company may be able to arrange to place their Italian phonograph interests in Mr. Copello's hands.³¹

In February 1891, the opera-loving Fabbri received, as a gift from Edison himself, a phonograph with which Fabbri was delighted.  On February 12, 1891, Fabbri wrote to Edison: ‘My dear Edison, Your beautiful gift in the shape of a specimen of your most wonderful invention, the phonograph, has at last arrived and is in working order, much to the delight and admiration of my whole family. It will be listened to by many friends, and I thank you heartily for the handsome present.’³² Edison received the letter on March 10, 1891. The passenger list for the Royal Holland Lines steamer Maasam reveals that Copello and his family disembarked in New York on March 12, 1891.  This suggests that it was Copello who delivered the phonograph and that, as of March 1891, Copello was still also dealing directly, if not exclusively, with Edison himself.                                              

The creation of Edison United was premised on the understanding that the Gouraud-controlled company would purchase a minimum amount of phonographs and supplies from the Edison Phonograph Works in the United States.  Gouraud balked.  Edison’s profits were dependent on the number of phonographs and the amount of supplies sold to Edison United.  Similarly, the only way for Copello to expand his Italian operations in the manner described in his 1889 circulars was to purchase enough machines to supply a viable business operation throughout Italy.  Absence of enough machines limited Copello to conducting traveling exhibitions.

By August 1892, relations between Edison and Gouraud descended into slapstick.  On August 2, 1892, Edison’s attorney advised: ‘My experience in dealing with Gouraud satisfied me that the only way to handle him is with a club.  A vigorous use of a club will bring him to time, but nothing less will.’ On August 3, 1892, Edison’s personal secretary explained to a correspondent:

The phonograph in Europe is controlled by the Edison United Phonograph Company, and Mr. Edison has no voice in its affairs.  He is in hope that the phonograph in Europe will sooner or later get into the hands of business men who will place the machine before the public there in a proper manner, something which has not yet been done.  The actions of those who control the invention on the other side of the Atlantic are unaccountable to Mr. Edison on any theory of business, and what their object can be is a mystery.  From the policy which has been pursued by them thus far it would seem that they have no desire to do business.³³

The phonograph was exhibited at the Genoa Columbus festivities, but there is as of yet, no document proving that it was operated by Copello.  However, in 1892, Copello was the only person at least ostensibly authorized to market the phonograph in Italy. Thus, he is the only person we know of who could have managed it, personally or through employees.  Copello’s finances became strained.  On May 23, 1892, Copello wrote directly to Edison asking for an extension to repay a $1,000 personal loan from Edison himself, advising that it was impossible for him to timely repay the loan, which was originally due on June 20, 1890.³⁴ Edison deferred collecting the loan. So, in the midst of Genoa’s Columbian festivities and weeks before the Esposizione Italo-American proper was set to open, Copello found himself strapped for cash.  It is then no surprise that the phonograph exhibit was pared down to a minimum.

If Copello was still limited to two machines, there was little he could do. The phonograph exhibit at the 1892 Columbian Festivities in Genoa was a far cry from the phonograph’s debut at the Paris World’s Fair three years earlier.  Having already been displayed in Genoa in August 1889, it was no longer a novelty.  Rather than being the center of attention, it was relegated not to the Esposizione Italo-American proper, but to a kiosk on the grounds of the neighboring Catholic Missions exhibits. ‘As we have already announced,’ stated Il Caffaro, ‘two days ago a kiosk was opened in the garden of this exhibition, where 23 collections of photographs are visible through powerful stereoscopes, and where there is a working phonograph.’

Scaled back, yes.  But not without interest.  A week before the Esposizione Italo-American opened, who should show up in Rome and, with great public fanfare, to record Roberto Stagno and Emma Bellencioni, the stars of Mascagni’s sensational new opera Cavalleria Rusticana?  Emile Durer, the enterprising impresario, Mascagni’s manager.³⁵ The French papers say that Durer made the recordings to send to Edison.  However, they likely ended up with Gouraud since they would have been made under the auspices of Edison United.  It is not yet known whether Durer used his own phonograph or made the recordings with the assistance of Copello and his employees.  Meantime, Sivori was in Genoa performing valedictory concerts, charity concerts and private salon recitals for Selene Hofer and other members of Genoa’s elite.

On August 5, 1892, Mascagni conducted a widely publicized concert of his works at the Ducal Palace in Genoa, presumably in the company of Durer as manager.³⁶ Stagno and Bellencioni arrived later.  Genoa during the Columbus Festivities was a hub of musical activity, with the presence of Verdi, Sivori, and countless opera singers and other musicians of international and local repute.  It cannot yet be said with certainty that Durer was there.  But it was on the route back from Rome to Paris, and a fertile ground for an impresario and his three prominent Italian clients.  Also, while Copello (or his employees), as far as is presently known, had only two phonographs at his disposal, precluding the grand displays that were possible in Paris in 1889, the Columbian Festivities would have provided an equally fertile ground to expand Copello’s library of recordings for use in the traveling exhibitions to which he was likely limited.

Copello had no choice but to work directly with the Gouraud London operation and with whoever succeeded him.  In marketing the phonograph in Italy, Copello 'made a great many trips to London and was constantly travelling through Italy interviewing the deputies and senate and generally working in the right quarters to make the phonograph a success,' wrote Wall Street financier Charles Henry Coster in an 1893 letter to Edison requesting a modest loan to see Copello through financial difficulties.  According to Coster, Fabbri had written Coster twice on Copello’s behalf.  Copello worked directly through London-based Edison United, managed by Gouraud.  Presumably, any cylinders recorded on machines loaned to Copello by Gouraud/Edison United remained their property.³⁷ This, combined with Copello’s frequent trips to London, explains how and why the Mystery Cylinders ended up there.

Sivori’s last concert

In 1895, Sivori’s friend, the young writer Egisto Roggero, published his first book, Vecchie Storie Musicale ('Old Musical Stories').  The fifth essay is entitled L’Ultimo concerto di Camillo Sivori – the final concert of Camillo Sivori.  Roggero tells a story he heard from one of Sivori’s intimate acquaintances: In the year before his death, Sivori performed at an elite soiree ‘in the drawing-room of one of the best aristocratic families of his Genoa.’  His hosts asked him to perform one of his own tours de force, a Moto Perpetuo, for which he had only written out the accompaniment but not the solo part because Sivori regarded this composition as his alone, not to be performed by others. According to Sivori’s friend and biographer Adele Pierrottet: ‘This strange fantasy, made in imitation of another of Paganini's, which enthralled both the listener and the orchestra, he performed it from memory in a way that truly astounded those who saw and heard it.’³⁸

In Roggero’s telling: ‘The pianist, with the music in front of him, begins the accompaniment.  But Sivori does not begin: What is it?  He has forgotten his favorite piece, his warhorse, the factor in so many of his triumphs! The poor old man is pale and visibly in pain: thick beads of sweat run down his noble forehead.  Everyone is deeply moved. He murmurs, smiling and resigned: - I am old, gentlemen, my memory serves me little use!...  This was Camillo Sivori's last concert.’  According to the Italian scholars granted access to the privately held Sivori Archive, there does indeed exist a Sivori Moto Perpetuo lacking a solo violin part, and for which only the orchestral score and piano accompaniment survive.  The outlines of Roggero’s tale are therefore confirmed.

The state of Sivori’s health, week to week and day to day, is crucial in determining whether this last concert could have taken place after the onset of illness in September 1893 and his return to Genoa in October.  If not, Sivori’s only known opportunity to have recorded the Mystery Cylinders is during the Columban festivities of 1892. Let’s tread this slippery ground carefully.  Sivori spent the winter and spring of 1893 in Genoa, writing at least twice to his good friend Selene Hofer.  On May 16, 1893, Sivori sent Hofer a note apologizing profusely that he could not play music with her the following evening as planned because of an unavoidable family obligation.  Days later, he was back in Paris.

 

Letter to Selene Hofer 16 May 1893, front

 

 

Letter to Selene Hofer 16 May 1893, overleaf

Recall, from our previous installment, that in the Spring of 1893, Sivori performed Paganini at a Parisian salon in the presence of Madame Remenyi while her husband, the violinist Edouard Remenyi, was winding up his affairs in Paris. Sivori wrote to his friends about his own good health and busy schedule.  As late as July 30, 1893, Sivori travelled some 200 kilometers from Paris to Tours to visit friends.  In late August 1893, he dined with Princess Mathilde Bonaparte at her summer home. In the midst of all this, he also ordered new photographs from the celebrity photographer Pierre Petit.

 

It was only in September 1893 that Sivori became seriously ill.  By October 30, 1893, he was well enough to return to Genoa. So when could this last concert have taken place?  Roggero’s witness told him it was within a year of Sivori’s death.  We know that, as of May 16, 1893, Sivori was still planning to perform music with Selene Hofer. There is no evidence of any decline in Sivori’s powers during his stay in Genoa prior to his return to Paris a few days after his note to Hofer. Ordering new publicity photographs does not suggest retirement. The Parisian soiree which Remenyi’s widow recalled must have taken place after Sivori’s arrival there in May 1893 but before Sivori fell ill in September 1893.  On November 12, 1893 Sivori wrote from Genoa that he wanted to return to Paris and play music with his ‘favorite pianist’ Francis Thomé.

 

Letter from Genoa 12 November 1893, front

 

 

 

Letter from Genoa 12 November 1893, overleaf

 

 

On November 21, 1893, the French press reported that Sivori’s health was completely restored and that he planned to return to Paris the following spring.³⁹                 

Regardless of his fluctuating health, Sivori evidenced no intention of ‘going gently into that good night.’[3] He wanted to go back to Paris.  Pierrottet tells us that Sivori planned to do so even the day before he died.  The paleness, thick beads of running sweat and visible pain which Roggero described suggest that Sivori was indeed physically ill during this ‘last concert,’ which is consistent with reports of his fluctuating health.  Because there is presently no evidence that Sivori’s musical vigor declined prior to his illnesses beginning the fall of 1893, the final concert Roggero described must have taken place after Sivori’s return to Genoa. Alas, there is no evidence that the phonograph made a reappearance in Genoa at any time in 1893. Now what?

A thoroughly implausible and farfetched deus ex machina neatly ties it all up

Around the time of Sivori’s return to Genoa, Sivori’s admirers formed the Società Drammatica Lirica di beneficenza Camillo Sivori (the Camillo Sivori Charity Dramatic Opera Society).  The Society appointed Sivori himself as its honorary president.  Formation of the Society coincided with Sivori’s precarious health and return to Genoa, suggesting that Sivori’s lifelong friends and admirers were hoping to rally his strength.  The Society’s concerts were held at the Sala Sivori, which served as its headquarters.  The inaugural concert took place on October 29, 1893.   The Society’s frequent concerts were well-attended and well-received. 

On January 23, 1894, Il Caffaro published a long article about the phonograph.  The article was serious, sentimental, satirical and even comical.  The phonograph, the author wrote, permits one to hear the voices of loved ones who are now far away, perhaps in America or Africa. ‘In this way you can create the illusion of being close to him, recapture the past – disprove those who believe that this past can never rise again, and leaves nothing behind.’  Within five days, the phonograph had returned to Genoa.

‘Il fonografo alla Sala Sivori’ proclaimed the headline in the January 28, 1894 edition of Il Caffaro: 

‘Edison’s portentous inventions, by now known to all, attracts every day to the Sala Sivori a discreet public of onlookers who never tire of enjoying the operatic pieces reproduced so perfectly by the wonderful instrument.

Having received many requests, the owner has decided to leave in a few days: I therefore believe that it is appropriate to take advantage of this favorable offer without delay so as not to miss out on so much fun.

The said phonograph still reproduces, which is difficult to find in others, the song for two voices: in fact the duet in Cavalleria Rusticana between Santuzza and Turiddu, performed by the tenor Pellegrino and the soprano Panizza, is faithfully reproduced by the said instrument. . .

The owner of this phonograph has been able to collect a repertoire of attractive and highly selected pieces, so that a phonograph audition in the Sala Sivori is equivalent to attending one of the most elite musical concerts.

Thus from the Serenata from Faust, Caterina idolized, masterfully performed by the bass Beltrami, to the romance of the 4^th act of the opera Pellegrina exquisitely illumined by the distinguished tenor Morales, to the farewell to the mother in Cavalleria Rusticana, to the Casta diva in Norma, to the suicide aria in the Mona Lisa, and a whole parade of motifs that come to delight our ears, giving us the perfect illusion of being in the theater and witnessing the melodramatic action.’

An astonishing little article.  Nothing could be farther from what Gouraud or Edison envisioned as realistic uses of the phonograph.  Because these phonographic concerts were held in the Sala Sivori suggests that the owner used a state-of-the-art horn for sufficient amplification instead of, or in addition to, the standard listening tubes.  A far cry from the stodgy Victorian government officials and businessmen that Gouraud liked to immortalize, or the stenography that Edison initially believed would be the phonograph’s most profitable application.  Classical concerts via the phonograph in Genoa in January 1894, and obviously elsewhere in Italy earlier – quite astonishing indeed.  Il Caffaro did not identify the ‘owner’ of the phonograph.  But the only person we currently know of with the resources and knowledge to create such a recorded library of Italian operatic celebrities is Copello, who had been so engaged since July 1889, beginning with the Giuseppe Kaschmann and Belletti recordings.

On January 30, 1894, a writer in Il Caffaro stated: ‘Today, then, is the last day.  The proprietors ask me to announce that, as they are about to leave for other cities, they are staying on today, inviting those who have not yet participated to enjoy the instructive and delightful entertainment.  Here is an opportunity that intelligent readers will certainly not miss.’ 

On February 8, 1894, alas, nine days after this last phonographic concert was to occur, Il Caffaro announced that Sivori, ‘the illustrious violinist, our compatriot, is now cured of the persistent illness that plagued him for so many months, and nothing more is needed now than the care and attention of convalescence.  Because of the friendship that he has always shown with Maestro Monleone, the great Sivori is very interested in the programme of the private concert that he is organising for the benefit of the families of the victims of Aigues-Mortes, and in his philanthropy and patriotism, he is very sorry that he will not be able to take an active part. In the meantime, we, rejoicing with the famous artist for his recovered health, hope and look forward to seeing him at the concert itself.’

            Are we too late?                                 

Almost, but not quite.  The proprietors of the phonograph exhibition had a change of heart. Il Caffaro for February 10, 1894 reported: ‘Starting tomorrow, for a few days, the Edison phonograph will no longer be displayed in the Sivori Hall, but in Maestro Bossola’s music shop, which is also open in the evening hours’ – Sivori’s old friend Maestro Bossola, sponsor of the Sala Sivori.  Sivori died nine days later. 

What we know and what we do not – some final thoughts

The Mystery Cylinders are consistent with other brown wax cylinders manufactured prior to Sivori’s death.  Sivori is the only violinist known to have performed and had access to the unpublished Second Violin Concerto.  At the earliest time that the Mystery Cylinders could have been made, Wilhelmj had abandoned public performance; there is no evidence in the Wilhelmj Archive that Wilhelmj ever met Sivori or performed any of his music. That leaves Sivori as the most plausible artist on the Sivori Concerto cylinders, provided he had the capacity to make the recordings and the opportunity to do so.  We have seen that Sivori remained active until shortly before his death. 

There were two time periods we know of when Sivori had the motivation and the opportunity to record his Second Violin Concerto and the two Paganini selections.  As we shall soon show in ‘Paganini’s Witches,’ our separate essay examining the ‘Witches’ Dance’ cylinders, Sivori had every motivation to do so, because Sivori was the last living exponent of Paganini’s style, as opposed to being merely a master of the techniques needed to perform the recently published scores.

The phonograph was present in Genoa during the 1892 Columbus festivities, in which Sivori participated.  The scaled-down phonograph exhibit was consistent with Copello’s dire financial straits and the lack of assistance from Gouraud and Edison.  Weighing in favor of 1892 are Sivori’s valedictory concerts in Genoa and his unquestioned continuing instrumental prowess.  However, ‘Sivori’s last concert,’ as recounted by Roggero, in all likelihood took place after Sivori’s return to Genoa in October 1893.  Sivori also could have recorded the Mystery Cylinders at any time from the arrival of the phonograph exhibition in Genoa in late January 1894 until the final relapse of his illness and death.  If that is the case, Sivori must have recorded his musical legacy within weeks or even days before his death, under circumstances as heroic as they are heartbreaking. 

Whether recorded in 1892 or 1894, Sivori is most likely the performer on the Paganini and Sivori Concerto cylinders and of the Witches’ Dance.  However, there presently is insufficient evidence to attribute The Gypsies or the Minuetto Pizzicato to Sivori, no matter how tempting it may be to do so.  The Mystery Cylinders are directly responsible for my discovery of the heretofore unsuspected and astonishing role Copello played in the history of early musical recordings.  Now that his significance is known, perhaps documentation will be unearthed which enables us to trace his activities with greater precision and certainty.

It is our fortune that Sivori, at the very end of his life, chose to preserve an art of which he was the last practitioner and which, with his passing, would die out with no possibility of revival.  Maestro Sivori’s recordings are an invitation to explore.  They are an invitation to aesthetic experiment, even danger.  A much needed invitation indeed.

These recordings most likely were made in the brief window between the arrival of the phonograph exhibition in Genoa in late January 1894 and Sivori’s death about three weeks later. If this is the case, an ailing Sivori nonetheless gathered his remaining strength, picked up his beloved violin and, with a superhuman tenacity, created a unique and irreplaceable legacy, his final triumph, magically reappearing throughout the world 130 years later. ‘Sivori is dead,’ the Violin Times announced in 1894.  To paraphrase Baron von Moltke, Sivori who has already long rested in his grave once again raises his voice and greets the present.  In the words of the Genoa students who carried Sivori home on their shoulders in 1892:

Viva Sivori!

© 2023 by Andrew O. Krastins. All rights reserved.

          

1. Il Caffaro, 12 February 1894.
2. The Etude, vo. 6, no. 12, November 28, 1888, p. 185.
3. The Musical Courier, vol. 18, no. 2, Jan. 9, 1889. 
4. TAE Papers/Digital: https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D8905ACF1
5. The Society of the Army of the Cumberland, Ninth Reunion, Cincinnati (1876).
6. New York Tribune, 5 August 1920, p. 6 (available online at https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83030214/1920-04-05/ed-1/seq-6/#date1=1770&index=1&rows=20&words=COPELLO+Copello+Enrico+ENRICO&searchType=basic&sequence=0&state=&date2=1963&proxtext=%22Enrico+Copello%22+&y=18&x=16&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1)
7. Gazzetta Ufficiale del Regno d’Italia, 23 August 1880; p. 3505 (available online at https://www.google.com/books/edition/Gazzetta_ufficiale_del_Regno_d_Italia/fKuSXVkcFnYC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Enrico+Copello+firenze&pg=PA3505&printsec=frontcover)
8. Letter from Hugh De Coursey Hamilton to Alfred Ord Tate, October 13th, 1889, TAE Papers online https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D8959AFL
9. Pittsburgh Dispatch; 15 August 1889, p. 4 (available online at https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/search/pages/results/?state=&date1=1889&date2=1890&proxtext=The+invention+awakened+great+interest+throughout+the+country&x=13&y=14&dateFilterType=yearRange&rows=20&searchType=basic
10. Sessa, Maurizio (2017) La famiglia Fabbri, p. 21-84; Edizioni Polistampa, Livorno; Hall, H. (Ed.) (1895); America’s Successful Men of Affairs, v. 1, p. 228; The New York Tribune.
11. Sessa, 82-85, 91-92.
12. Letter from Egisto Paolo Fabbri to Thomas Alva Edison, February 22nd, 1891, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D9148AAF
13. Letter from Hugh De Coursey Hamilton to Alfred Ord Tate, October 13th, 1889 TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D8959AFL
14. Il Caffaro; “Gli Esperimenti del Fonografo a Palazzo Tursi;” 27 August 1889.
15. Gil Blas, 13 August 1889, p. 4; BNF https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k7538297x/f4.image.r=Kaschmann%20Copello%20Gil%20Blas?rk=21459;2; Le XIX Siecle; 14 August 1889, p. 2; BNF https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k75608765/f3.image.r=Kaschmann%20Copello%20edison?rk=42918;4; Musical Courier, 11 September 1889, p. 229.
16. Il Cittadino, “Il fonografo al municipo”; 27 August 1889. 
17. Letter from Mina Miller Edison to Mary Valinda (Mrs. Lews) Miller, August 12th, 1889; TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/X018A702(accessed 27 Sept. 2023).
18. TAED: http://edison.rutgers.edu/digital/document/LB029010
19. Letter from Thomas Alva Edison to George Edward Gouraud dated 12 April 1889, TAED: https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/LB029076 (accessed on 11 September 2018).
20. Letter from Thomas Alva Edison to William Joseph Hammer, April 19th, 1889 TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/X098A029 (accessed 27 September 2023).
21. Telegram from Thomas Alva Edison to George Edward Gouraud, August 14th, 1889, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D8905AFC (accessed 27 September 2023).
22. Le Figaro, 14 August 1889, BNF https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k2808528/f1.image.r=(prOx:%20%22Edison%22%2020%20%22Capello%22)?rk=64378;0
23. Il Caffaro, Supplemento al numero 235; “Edison e l’Italia”; 23 August 1889; p. 1.
24. Le Figaro, 17 August 1889 BNF https://www.auction.fr/vente/collections-manuscrits-livres-photographies-timbres-de-chine-et-divers-bandes-dessinees-615335?page=4
25. The King Umberto cylinder – in its original box – was recently acquired by the British Library and was identified as the 1889 Copello cylinder by Andrew O. Krastins.
26. Alexandra Rimer, Seduced by the Light: the Mina Miller Edison Story (2023), p. 108.
27. Il Caffaro, 23 August 1889.
28. Il Caffaro Supp., 23 August 1889; Il Caffaro, 24, 27 August 1889.
29. Letter from Enrico Copello to Thomas Alva Edison, December 28th, 1889, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D8905AKI (accessed 27 September 2023).
30. Letter from Alfred Ord Tate to Enrico Copello, January 17th, 1890, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/LB036118 (accessed 27 September 2023).
31. Letter from Alfred Ord Tate to Thomas Childs, May 3rd, 1890, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/LB040404 (accessed 27 September 2023).
32. Letter from Egisto Paolo Fabbri to Thomas Alva Edison, February 22nd, 1891, TAE Papers: https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D9148AAF (accessed 27 September 2023).
33. Letter from Alfred Ord Tate to William Lynd, August 3rd, 1892. TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D9211ACB (accessed 27 September 2023).
34. Letter from Alfred Ord Tate to Enrico Copello, June 9th, 1892, TAED  https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/LB056645 (accessed 27 September 2023).
35. Le Menestrel, Journal du Musique,. 3 July 1892, p. 215; BNF https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k5614503x/f6.image.r=Durer%20Menestrel%20Stagno%201892MenestrelDurerEdison?rk=21459;2 (accessed 27 September 2023).
36. Il Caffaro 15 July 1892, p. 2.
37. Letter from Charles Henry Coster to Thomas Alva Edison, January 31st, 1893, TAED https://edisondigital.rutgers.edu/document/D9302AAG (accessed 27 September 2023).
38. Pierrottet, p. 85. 
39. La Charente: Organ Republicain Quotidien, 21 November 1893.