VOA慢速英语2015 新技术让我们听到19世纪80年代著名的声音
时间：2019-01-12 作者：英语课 分类：2015年VOA慢速英语(三)月
AS IT IS 2015-03-11 New Technology Lets Us Hear Famous Voice from 1880s 新技术让我们听到19世纪80年代著名的声音
Today, March 10th, is the anniversary of the first successful telephone call. Alexander Graham Bell was one of the inventors of the telephone. He completed that first call 139 years ago. He also played an important part in creating sound recordings 2. The National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. recently opened an exhibition that plays sounds recorded by Mr. Bell in the 1880s.
“This record has been made by Alexander Graham Bell…”
That is the only confirmed audio recording 1 of Alexander Graham Bell's voice. He says: “This record has been made by Alexander Graham Bell…”
The wax and cardboard disc recording was made in 1885. It captured the inventor’s words as he recited numbers for about four minutes. This is how he ended the recording:
“…in witness whereof, hear my voice, Alexander Graham Bell.”
Carlene Stephens is the curator of the exhibit, which is called “Hear My Voice.”
“We had a paper transcript 3 signed by him with what was on the recording. When we finally heard the voice, it was quite thrilling.”
The experimental recordings were made using different techniques and materials. The materials include wax discs and glass discs.
Peter Alyea is a digital conversion 4 specialist at the Library of Congress. He and two other scientists discovered the recordings about two years ago. He used a special device to play the sound from a disc or a cylinder 5 record. It does so without touching 6 the surface.
“The imaging system takes a picture of the surface of the media. These images are pictures of grooves 7 that move in certain ways, and that motion contains the sound. That digital image can then be processed by a piece of software and turns them into sound.”
Carlene Stephens says the Smithsonian hopes to use the system to play sounds from its collection of 500 early recordings. She believes the next generation of inventors will be inspired by them.
Words in This Story
disc – n. a flat, thin, round object that is used to store information
exhibition – n. a public show of something, such as a work of art
recite – v. to say or describe a series or list of things
- How long will the recording of the song take?录下这首歌得花多少时间？
- I want to play you a recording of the rehearsal.我想给你放一下彩排的录像。
- a boxed set of original recordings 一套盒装原声录音带
- old jazz recordings reissued on CD 以激光唱片重新发行的老爵士乐
- A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
- They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。
- He underwent quite a conversion.他彻底变了。
- Waste conversion is a part of the production process.废物处理是生产过程的一个组成部分。
- What's the volume of this cylinder?这个圆筒的体积有多少？
- The cylinder is getting too much gas and not enough air.汽缸里汽油太多而空气不足。