The Century of Sounds project I mentioned last year is now complete, and here is my contribution ‘Eulogy for Freddy Hill’.
As a starting point for this project, I did some research into the person who played the barrel organs on the recording. It transpired that Freddy Hill (born 1932 in Sussex, UK) was a very gifted man. The son of a headmaster and a clockmaker by profession, he also taught carpentry and music and was an expert restorer of antique musical instruments including the chamber barrel organs in this recording. Freddy was a founder member of the Musical Box Society of Great Britain which was established in 1962. The three barrel organs being played here were built between 1764 and 1850, and the recordings were made in April 1967 after Freddy’s repairs and restoration. Most of the sounds on this 42-minute recording are of Freddy speeding through the barrel organ cylinders to check functionality, however the “Morning Hymn’”and “Evening Hymn” sections are played through at a nice pace and stood out to me, so I extracted these as the base for my work.
After a number of abandoned approaches, rather than “reinterpret” the sounds, I have built a world around them, orchestrating with strings and brass, and blending sounds both natural and unnatural into the mix aiming to give the finished track a widescreen feel. I considered contacting Freddy to tell him what I was doing, but he died in 2005. It was at that point I realised that this piece could be my small tribute to his life, hence the title I have chosen. Via Facebook I managed to locate someone who knew Freddy, and they have agreed to inform his only known relative; his nephew Michael Richards – of this project and submission.
Freddy’s collection of clocks, musical instruments and barrel organs were bequeathed to the Royal College of Music.
WHAT IS A CENTURY OF SOUNDS?
A Century of Sounds is a collaborative project between Cities and Memory and the Pitt Rivers Museum at the University of Oxford, to celebrate and creatively reimagine a century of ethnographic sound recordings from the museum’s archives. The project features 100 rare and previously unheard recordings from around the world. Artists from across the globe were invited to select one recording and create a new composition in response, exploring themes of history, culture, emotion, and memory. The resulting 100 compositions are showcased in the museum’s unique ‘sound shower’ space.
The Message Tapes 