Sound Recording Culture Day

What Is Sound Recording Culture Day?

November 16th is "Sound Recording Culture Day" in Japan. On November 16th, 1878 (Meiji 11), James Alfred Ewing, a British teacher invited to the University of Tokyo, used a phonograph he had brought with him to carry out Japan's first experiment in recording and playing back sound. The day was established by the Japan Recording-Media Industries Association (now dissolved).

The Day a Voice Was First Played Back in Japan

Ewing was one of the so-called "oyatoi gaikokujin," foreign experts hired by the Meiji government to bring Western learning and technology to Japan. His experiment is remembered as the event that first gave Japan the experience of recording sound and hearing it again.

• Origin of the date: Japan's first sound recording and playback experiment on November 16th, 1878
• Who carried it out: James Alfred Ewing, a British teacher at the University of Tokyo
• The machine used: a phonograph Ewing brought to Japan
• Established by: the Japan Recording-Media Industries Association, made up of recording media makers and others (now dissolved)

Recording Technology Keeps Changing Shape

Sound recording, which began with the phonograph, has changed form over the years, from records and cassette tapes to CDs and digital audio. Today a single smartphone lets us do everything from recording meetings to producing music. What happened in a Meiji-era laboratory is connected to the conveniences we take for granted today.

Tips for Marking This Day

• Listen again to the records, cassettes or CDs tucked away at home
• Use your smartphone's voice memo app to record ideas or plans
• Record sounds you want to keep, like family voices or a child's singing
• Chat with colleagues of different generations about how recording media have changed

A Day to Rethink the Value of Preserving Sound

Recording sound and playing it back again and again is ordinary today, but in Japan it began with a single experiment more than 140 years ago. November 16th is a day to appreciate being able to preserve voices and music.