Sound Recordings

By the time Vinyl records and record players started becoming cheep enough to be put in homes my grandfather had already left home to go to college and join the air force. He does state though, that when he was home his family kept the record player in the living room. At home, his family listened to a lot of classical music and musicals, his mother loved musicals. My grandfather is an engineer so naturally he likes building things. He talks fondly of the time he was in the air force and he had his first vinyl, which was a 44-RPM player. In 1951, while in the service he had this player and made his own hifi amplifier for it. After his years in the service he went to the University of Missouri to get a degree in engineering. In college, he owned a 33 1/3 where once again he built an amplifier for it. When asked what kind of music he listened to he replied with the album "Something Cool," by June Christy and then David Brubeck's album "Brubeck's Jazz Festival at New Port."   

Both artist offer very smooth sounding music, what my sister would refer to as elevator music. It's easy to see why these were among my grandfathers favorites. 

He also talked about being part of a record club, which meant every month he would get a new record of something that was popular or that the club thought he might enjoy. This is really how he got into certain types of music and found out about Artist's. We went on to talk about if he had any censors on his music, but considering he was out of the house by the time he got a record player there was really no one to control him. He listened to whatever he wanted to and how ever loud he wanted to listen to it. Although, I don't think my grandpa listened to any music that would be considered risqué!

My grandmother chimed in at this point stating that her cousins were not allowed to listen to Elvis Presley because, her uncle was so appalled by his behavior. I don't think this was very uncommon at the time either. Elvis was young and his dance moves were a little risqué. When someone comes on to the scene and pushes the limits of what people think is acceptable there is going to be some naysayers. It still happens today. Once you start thinking about it, no one is against Elvis now.  Think about the artist's today that are seen as risqué, what will they be seen as in the future! As my grandparents have three children, I asked if they put any controls on there music. My grandfather replied, “Ya, to turn it down!” Today my grandparents don’t really listen to sound recordings. The only time my grandfather listens to music is when he’s in the car or singing in the church choir. My grandmother occasionally puts in a classical CD and I have even made her a mix CD of some of her favorite Pop songs of the 21st century.  My Grandfather states, “ I like the peaceful quiet of nature.” It’s a good thing they live in the woods where there is plenty of nature!

Introductions

This Semester I will be blogging for my semester long project in Mass Communication. For this project, I will be conducting interviews with my grandfather and grandmother. Through these interviews I will be discussing with them how the mass communication of sound recordings, radio, television, movies and print have shaped their lives.  I chose to interview my grandfather because he likes to tell stories and since my grandparents are always together my grandma couldn’t help but chime in her thoughts as well.  Let me introduce my Grandfather John. He was born in Canton, Missouri on December 17, 1930 to German Farmers. My grandfather was a farm boy through in through and he loves to tell stories of how he grew up without electricity, plumbing, and much more. My Grandmother Joanne, born December 1937  in Quincy, Illinois has a different insight into the subject. I conducted these interview's by meeting them in Columbia, Missouri for Lunch. 

A picture of my grandparents at a Mizzou Football game. They will be celebrating 54 years of marriage this June.