One of the biggest shocks to hit us Boomer kids was hearing our voices recorded for the first time.
In the 50's and 60's, tape recorders were far from common. The devices were costly, and our fathers were too busy spring for pricey essentials like color televisions to consider spending as much as fifty hard-earned dollars on such a useless gadget.
But about 1968, a house guest brought over a gadget that would for the first time reveal to me what I would consider to be my high, pipsqueak voice: a portable tape recorder.
The human skull causes one's own voice to reverberate and deepen before it reaches the ears of the speaker. Therefore, the untainted product as captured straight form its source invariably sounds higher than what one is used to.
Of course, nowadays, kids are used to hearing their own voices at a very young age. The debut of the camcorder in the early 1980's saw to that. Plus, cassette decks became cheap and available during the decade previous to that, so that most households had a means to record to tape. And in this day and age of digital video and audio reproduction, it's difficult to image a kid at the ripe old age of eight being shocked by the sound of his own voice.
But times were slower, simpler, and less technical when the Boomer generation was roaming the planet as children.
I remember that I was very curious as to what my recorded voice sounded like. So when the opportunity finally presented itself, I eagerly grabbed the microphone and started speaking.
I was quite distraught to hear a voice come out of the speakers that sounded like it was coming from a girl!
My fascination with my own voice continued as I grew older. I got my hands on a cassette deck when I was thirteen, and enjoyed reading the dialog from comic books into it, to be followed along later with the comic book in hand.
Yeah, I was a weird kid.
Speaking of recording one's own voice, I haven't forgotten about podcasts. I have turned into a Linux user and advocate, but unfortunately i have not yet found a solution to high-quality recordings with my current setup.
So here's to a simpler day when things that we take for granted now, like cheap digital recording technology, were far off into the future.
Comments (4)
Good one!
Posted by Mike Ransom | March 17, 2008 2:17 PM
Posted on March 17, 2008 14:17
Having worked part-time weekend jobs in radio for about 19 years, I was sometimes asked to read the weather forecasts and public service announcements. I would practice at home by reading newspaper articles or some of the thrown out stories from the station' AP/UPI printers into my small cassette recorder. And, like many people, I hate the sound of my voice.
Posted by David S Paleg | March 17, 2008 9:08 PM
Posted on March 17, 2008 21:08
I did th same thing with comic books and tape recorders. I acted out all the parts and even read the narration in a Ted Baxter kind of voice.
Now I'm a professional actor so i guess it was a hsrbibger if things to come.
I wasn't mortified when I first heard my voice on my big sister's tape recorder circa 1968...I remember falling down laughing. My dad still has an audio recording of me being interviewed on the local news from summer camp when i was about 8.
Posted by Lee Morris | March 19, 2008 10:42 PM
Posted on March 19, 2008 22:42
I do not know how my father came about it but he had one of those small reel to real units made by Craig. It was interesting briefly in maybe around 68 or 69. But it would take cassettes for me to get interested as music was my concern, plugging RadioShack wires from headphone jack to mic input, taping the radio about 73. It grew from there.
Posted by Scott Irv | June 1, 2009 1:32 PM
Posted on June 1, 2009 13:32