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Entries in tapes (2)

Thursday
Dec032009

The old Yellow AGFA tape

The tape recorder my mama (uncle) purchased in the late seventies was a novelty item in those days. It was amazing to watch how it recorded sounds and would play it back.

The tape recorder did not have a built in radio in those days. If we wanted to record programs broadcast on All India Radio, we would have to keep our Philips transistor radio (which was the size of a small TV.. not todays flat screen mini 7inch LCD's.. but CRT TV's from the nineties.. boy I talk of the nineties in the distant past.. that means I am old.. very old.. cut cut cut.. change topic!)

The one tape that always would bring me back a lot of memories was a meera bhajan (?!) on Radha. No one is sure who the singer was except grandma who tells me it was someone from Hyderabad named Sita and she was a Station director or something at AIR Hyderabad.

On my last trip, was told that the tape is "no more".

If anyone can give me a audio link to this song or even tell me correct lyrics, would really appreciate it..

It is a Hindi song and my transliteration is based on my poor grasp of the hoarse recording. But even with all that noise, the original song is just so touching that it would make me want to cry every time I listened to it. The voice was so imploring, beseeching that it would touch a yearning inside you for things that you don't know you are missing.. (okay, I really don't know what was going through my head while writing that last sentence, but for some vague reason, those are pretty much the words that come up).

Raadha pyaari thee
darohi banthi--e hamaari

gadi ek pal me
gadi ek mukh me
gadi ek avala dhari -ee saari
meera ke prabho giridhar dhar?
Charana kamal pal haari

Please do let me know.

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Wednesday
Nov042009

Audio tapes to MP3

An old box full of audiotapes has been dusted out.

They contain precious recordings from 1977 to 1994..

Including the only tape of my childhood voice singing a few lines of "kandar Shasti kavasam", my grandpa reciting Vishnu Sahasranamam for me the day before I first left for the US of A, my grandma singing me my favorite Carnatic songs, audio of a concert where I got to sit on the stage (as Mic boy) and enjoy Lalgudi Jayaraman and his kids perform, etc. etc.

Most of the tapes seem to be deteriorating and I might have one chance to transfer them to digital format before they self destruct!

so the question is..

If any of you who read this blog in the US have converted Audio tapes to MP3, is there a product out there that you would recommend? (some kind of tape recorder that outputs MP3? or connects to your laptop through USB? and then you can import it into itunes?)

Please do let me know.

Life has been busy with work, ice cream, physiotherapy, listening to music, voting, enjoying time with the wife and kids, not particularly in any order..

Lots to write, but it has to wait. Until Friday...

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