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Imperfect Sound Forever: Loudness, Listening Formations, and the Historiography of Sound Reproduction

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Imperfect Sound Forever: Loudness, Listening Formations, and the Historiography of Sound Reproduction Imperfect Sound Forever: Loudness, Listening Formations, and the Historiography of Sound Reproduction by Kyle Devine A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate and Postdoctoral Affairs in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Cultural Mediations Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario ©2012 Kyle Devine Library and Archives Bibliotheque et Canada Archives Canada Published Heritage Direction du Branch Patrimoine de I'edition 395 Wellington Street 395, rue Wellington Ottawa ON K1A0N4 Ottawa ON K1A 0N4 Canada Canada Your file Votre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-89334-0 Our file Notre reference ISBN: 978-0-494-89334-0 NOTICE: AVIS: The author has granted a non­ L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive exclusive license allowing Library and permettant a la Bibliotheque et Archives Archives Canada to reproduce, Canada de reproduire, publier, archiver, publish, archive, preserve, conserve, sauvegarder, conserver, transmettre au public communicate to the public by par telecommunication ou par I'lnternet, preter, telecommunication or on the Internet, distribuer et vendre des theses partout dans le loan, distrbute and sell theses monde, a des fins commerciales ou autres, sur worldwide, for commercial or non­ support microforme, papier, electronique et/ou commercial purposes, in microform, autres formats. paper, electronic and/or any other formats. The author retains copyright L'auteur conserve la propriete du droit d'auteur ownership and moral rights in this et des droits moraux qui protege cette these. Ni thesis. Neither the thesis nor la these ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci substantial extracts from it may be ne doivent etre imprimes ou autrement printed or otherwise reproduced reproduits sans son autorisation. without the author's permission. In compliance with the Canadian Conformement a la loi canadienne sur la Privacy Act some supporting forms protection de la vie privee, quelques may have been removed from this formulaires secondaires ont ete enleves de thesis. cette these. While these forms may be included Bien que ces formulaires aient inclus dans in the document page count, their la pagination, il n'y aura aucun contenu removal does not represent any loss manquant. of content from the thesis. Canada ABSTRACT This thesis engages critically with the historiography of sound reproduction. A significant portion of this literature has been concerned to understand sound reproduction in the context of modernity, as both acoustic consequence and contributing factor. My argument is that the relationship between sound reproduction and "acoustic modernity" has been mapped according to four prominent themes - fidelity, privacy, rationality, objectivity - and that each of these themes is valuable and illuminating but limited. Through a series of case studies in loudness and electrical amplification (ca. 1910s-1930s), I complement the existing historiography by demonstrating that while these themes were indeed prominent in discourses of sound reproduction, as ideals they were imperfectly achieved - offset and altered by a variety of equally significant but often contrasting precepts and practices. The goal is not to posit these differences in terms of dualisms or dialectics (fidelity/ infidelity, privacy/publicity, rationality/irrationality, objectivity/subjectivity), but to understand them as mutually constitutive functions of what I call listening formations. "Listening formation" is an analytical and methodological concept that promotes, if not exactly a "better" definition of acoustic modernity or a multiplicity of acoustic modernities, then a conception of the audible past that is able to hold its various practical and conceptual orientations toward sound in states of co-productive tension. In contrast to a uniform conception of acoustic modernity that is discernible in the historiography of sound reproduction, "listening formation" more readily delineates the vicissitudes of acoustic and musical culture during this period. I argue that if there is anything distinctly ii modern about the acoustic, or that if there is anything distinctly acoustic about modernity, the distinction has perhaps more to do with the particular logics of listening formations than the rise of a modern soundscape or modern aurality as such. By situating listening formations in relation to the wider reorientations toward knowledge, the environment and the self that characterize the project of modernity, this thesis strives toward a deeper understanding of the modern era as an acoustic phenomenon. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS As my research headquarters, the Institute for Comparative Studies in Literature, Art and Culture has been world class. In particular, I want to thank Paul Theberge and John Shepherd, along with Franny Nudelman and Barbara Leckie, for offering so much of their time, wisdom and acuity, right from the get-go. Dawn Schmidt and Mitchell Frank made the submission process a breeze. Chris Faulkner taught me two of the most important things: cultural theory and softball. ICSLAC and Carleton University provided financial support throughout this project. The final years were also funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the Ontario Graduate Scholarship program. Some of this research is on its way to being printed elsewhere, and I thank those publishers for letting me reproduce parts of the following: "Imperfect Sound Forever: Loudness Wars, Listening Formations, and the History of Sound Reproduction," in Popular Music 32.2 (2013); "Electronic Instruments" and "Sound Studies," in The Grove Dictionary of American Music, second edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013). A lot of the ideas about research and writing that underpin this thesis were hatched during my time at the University of Edinburgh. Thanks to Simon Frith and everyone in his 2006-2007 popular music seminars for so many formative discussions and lasting impressions. Thanks are also due to Simon for welcoming me back as a visiting student in 2009 and, along with the seminar crew, for giving additional shape to this project at a crucial stage. iv A number of allies have offered priceless help, advice and encouragement along the way. Thanks to Anna Khimasia and all my fellow students at ICSLAC, with a special nod to Paul Jasen and the Sound Studies Group - and an extra special nod to Tom Everrett. Tom is a rare colleague and a real friend; without him, this whole process would have been a lot less interesting and a lot less fun. My research would have been more difficult without the assistance of many archivists and librarians. Thanks to Sylvie Bertrand at the Canada Science and Technology Museum, Florence Hayes at Library and Archives Canada, George Kupczak at the AT&T Archives and History Center, Ken Yaxley (and Crackers!) at the History of Public Address Museum, and to the staffs of the Carleton's Interlibrary Loan department and the W.D. Jordan Special Collections at Queen's University. On my trips to the UK for conferences and research, I'm fortunate to have shared ideas, pints and teas with the best of the best. Thanks to Kirstin Anderson, Melissa Avdeef, Matt Brennan, Martin Cloonan, Kieran Curran, Mary Fogarty, Mark Percival, Nick Prior, Luis Sanchez and Theresa Steward. I want to thank some other friends, too. To Scott and Rocky, Phil and Triscilla, and Jamie et al., for making Ottawa a home away from home. To Chris, Erin and Eloise, and James and Eric, for making Montreal a home away from home away from home. Last but not least, I want to thank my family. To my dad, for being so reliably generous, patient and proud. To my brother, my grandparents, and everyone else - from Calgary to Winnipeg and Kilsyth to Bergen - for their support. Most of all, I want to thank my mum. She was there for me when I started at Carleton but did not live to see me finish. This thesis is for her. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract ii Acknowledgments iv List of illustrations vii INTRODUCTION A mysterious music in the air: listening formations and acoustic modernity 1 CHAPTER 1 Fidelity: a complicated cat fight in a mustard mill 24 CHAPTER 2 Privacy: an imposing loudspeaker 61 CHAPTER 3 Rationality: a new lease on life 99 CHAPTER 4 Objectivity: a decibel by any other name 139 CONCLUSION Listening formations: for a history of loudness 195 Bibliography 215 vi LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1. "Welcome to our shores" (1878) 63 Figure 2. "Radio megaphone is large enough for a diving platform" (1922) 71 Figure 3. "Victor dance music ... brings joy with every step" (1922) 90 Figure 4. "A Radio Dance in your home" (1929) 92 Figure 5. "Section of the cochlea of the guinea pig" (1936) 139 vii INTRODUCTION A mysterious music in the air: listening formations and acoustic modernity This thesis started out as an attempt to mimic one of my favourite books - Oranges, by writer and journalist John McPhee. McPhee opens with a curveball: drinking orange juice, as so many of us do every morning at breakfast, is actually quite curious; it's not a very widespread custom. In fact, drinking orange juice is one among dozens of equally curious ways of consuming oranges around the world. Instead of juicing them or even just peeling them, as we tend to, oranges are halved and salted in Trinidad and Tobago, eaten with knives and forks in parts of Europe. Oranges have an interesting iconographic history, too. They often appear beside wine bottles in the still-lifes of the Dutch and Flemish masters, reflecting a widespread fondness for bitters in the Low Countries. But when Italian Renaissance artists portray oranges at, say, the Last Supper, or alongside the Virgin Mary (as a symbols of wealth and purity), they are guilty of an anachronism: the Bible makes no mention of this citrus fruit, and orange trees did not grow in the Holy Land during the time of Christ. Oranges haven't even always been called oranges: they used to be called apples.
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