Norwegian Sound Archive Conference 2009

The Norwegian Institute of Recorded Sound leads the organizing of the Norwegian Sound Archive Conference, taking place in Trondheim between October 27 and 29. Go to the Conference Website for details (English only).

Norwegian Sound Archive Conference 2007

The Norwegian Institute of Recorded Sound hosted the Norwegian Sound Archive Conference on October 24th. and 25th, 2007. Go to the Conference Website for details.

Asbjørn Straumfors from the National Library of Norway acted as Master of Ceremonies and Jens T. Larsen, head of the Department of Music and Dance at the University of Stavanger welcomed the conference delegates. Keynote speaker was Ray Edmondson from Australia.

Text: Dag Trygve Henriksen

Ray Edmondson

Ray Edmondson has for a long time been employed by the Australian National Film & Sound Archive, but these days he runs his own firm, Archive Associates. He has furthermore written the book Audiovisual Archiving : Philosophy and Principles, published by UNESCO in 1998, with a new edition in 2004. Besides, he is an active member of several organizations whose main occupation is to preserve the audiovisual heritage of the world.

In his Keynote Speach he emphasized the importance of not only preserve the sound itself as digital files, but also the context as LP covers, written material and more as well as the original sound carrier. The fact that sound recordings belongs to the time they were recorded, and played on vintage reproducing equipment the recording gives an original experience, in many cases with better sound quality than later reissues or restored reissues. Many people nowadays has never heard a 78 record played on a 78 player, and Edmondson brought out the point that sound engineers working on digitizing and restoration of sound recordings has to have knowledge of the original sound reproduction system.

The Compact Disc, Dead On Arrival - report from a funeral

This was the title of Arild Rønsen's contribution. With his background of editor of the Norwegian Music Magazine Puls, he did some reflections on the development of the music industry from the LP days over the CD's to the digital downloads of today. He predicted that in 4-5 years from now, the CD shop will not exist anymore. Furthermore he let of a bombshell when talking about peoples willingness to actually pay for the music they listen to, - some people is serious when they claim that "paying is unfare, the music is free anyway". He emphasized that a change of attitude is most necessary if musicians in the future as today wants to make a living of composing and performing their music.

Rock the Country

Part of the conference programme the second day was dedicated to the ongoing debate on the new norwegian national centre of popular music in Trondheim and the regional centres. This session started with showing some highlights from the Norwegian film Ragnarock which the National Library of Norway has restored.

In the following debate, a panel of delegates from the new National Centre for Popular Music - "Rocheim" in Trondheim, Schaus kulturbryggeri - Popsenteret in Oslo, Stavanger Public Library - Music and Film Department and the Norwegian National Library - Norwegian Music Collection in Oslo discussed aspects on cooperation between, and the development of the different centres.

When the performative aspect perforates the idea of the work

The final speaker of the conference was Per Dahl, who gave the audience a brief look into his material on Edvard Grieg's romance I Love You. Per Dahl has analyzed 214 different recordings, and he played several examples of different interpretations of this music. The title of his lecture When the performative aspect perforates the idea of the work alluded to how sound recordings and technical possibilities have brought the performer into the spotlight thus forcing the idea of the composers composition into the background. Dahl showed this by playing different recordings where some performers have used the recording technologies to the full extent, others have not (who maybe should have), while some performers used Griegs music only as a foundation for their's own expressions. Read a summary of Per Dahls Doctoral Thesis (pdf file).

Finally...

we have to admit that this year's Sound Archive Conference was a successful event. In additon to the programme in the Concert Hall of the Institute of Music and Dance at the University of Stavanger, the delegates were given guided tours in the premises of the Norwegian Institute of Recorded Sound, the Music Department of Stavanger University Library and a lecture on the Culture Memory Project Frigg at the Norwegian Petroleum Museum.

In the last session, the baton was presented to Trondheim where the conference will be hosted in 2009. We look forward to this occation already!

More information (in norwegian):

Norwegian Sound Archive Conference 2009
Norwegian Sound Archive Conference 2007
Norwegian Sound Archive Conference 2005.
Programme 2005. A report of the 2005 conference is available by approach.

Statutes of the Norwegian Conference of Sound Archives

Preservation plan for Norwegian sound recordings (ed. Per Dahl, 1997)

The Organizing Committee 2007 consisted of the following members: Jacqueline von Arb, Chair (Norwegian Institute of Recorded Sound & MemNor Audio Archiving Services), Asbjørn Inge Straumfors (National Library of Norway), Arve Sigvaldsen (Talent Video og Audio Produksjon as), Svanlaug Takle (Stavanger University Library, dep. Bjergsted), Katrine Raade (Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation) and Elisabeth Bertheussen (Sandnes Public Library, Music Department).