Fonotopia Radio

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Welcome to Fonotopia – the world on record.

Fonotopia will resurrect the most beautiful music recorded on 78 rpm discs during the first decades of the 20th century.

Ian Nagoski loves this music to death. The vast scope of his knowledge about it is scary. He tells funny stories. He’ll be your host.

Each week, Ian will bring you an hour of resurrected gems tied to a theme. Some themes are specific -- like virtuosic vocalists. Some are grand -- like "life."

And the songs? Oh, the songs! Middle Eastern oud masters driving dancers into a frenzy? Romanian cantors memorializing Holocaust victims? American country legends leaving aural suicide notes? Portuguese fado singers celebrating the dignity of the poor? We don’t discriminate. If it’s astounding and it was recorded, you’ll hear it and you’ll learn the story of the people and culture that made it.

Series

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4 Pieces

Welcome to Fonotopia – the world on record. Fonotopia will resurrect the most beautiful music recorded on 78 rpm discs during the first decades of the 20th century. Ian Nagoski loves this music to death. The vast scope of his knowledge about it is scary. He tells funny stories. He’ll be your host. Each week, Ian will bring you an hour of resurrected gems tied to a theme. Some themes are specific -- like virtuosic vocalists. Some are grand -- like "life." And the songs? Oh, the songs! Middle Eastern oud masters driving dancers into a frenzy? Romanian cantors memorializing Holocaust victims? American country legends leaving aural suicide notes? Portuguese fado singers celebrating the dignity of the poor? We don’t discriminate. If it’s astounding and it was recorded, you’ll hear it and you’ll learn the story of the people and culture that made it.


Pieces

Caption: Okeh Laughing Record
The agony, the ecstasy, the all, the nothing, the becoming, the existing, the decaying. Yup: life, expressed in 59 minutes of music from all corner...

  • Added: Aug 11, 2010
  • Length: 59:02
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In this episode, Ian takes you from Mozart’s grandparents to the last days of the Turkish Pretty Boy Floyd. The Ottoman Empire was vast. Think of a...

  • Added: Aug 10, 2010
  • Length: 59:01
Caption: Brother Claude Ely
Lance Ledbetter of the Grammy-winning Dust-to-Digital label joins Ian to explore the sounds, stories, and sermons of early Southern gospel music. S...

  • Added: Aug 10, 2010
  • Length: 59:00
Caption: Nissar Hussain Khan
We travel to India, Switzerland, East Texas, and South New Jersey on the trail of some of the finest examples of that most universal and ancient of...

  • Added: Aug 10, 2010
  • Length: 59:00