RESOUND A QUARTERLY OF THE Archives of Traditional Music Volume V, Number 1 January 1986 Herzog was able to attend lectures on the comparative George Herzog: Struggles of a study of folk and primitive music given by members of the Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv, Europe's largest sound Sound Archivist archive. From 1922 through 1924, Herzog served as an Carol F. Inman unpaid research assistant to the director of the Archiv, Erich M. von Hornbostel, helping to organize the collections and transcribing over four hundred of the The papers and research materials of George Herzog, cylinders. leading ethnomusicologist of the 1930s to the early 1950s, Von Hornbostel's insistence upon precision and are now available at the Archives of Traditional Music. objectivity made a lasting impression on Herzog, whose These materials not only add insight into the life of this later attempts to establish an American sound archive consummate scholar, but also chronicle the development were modeled after the standards set by his mentor. The of the discipline in an era characterized by rapid Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv was a center for scholarly transformations in recording technology and the research in comparative musicology, and it expended relocation of ethnographic sound documents. That considerable time and energy towards the dissemination Herzog's publications successfully integrate the theoretical of world music. Von Hornbostel coordinated an shift between the German school of comparative international exchange of the nearly 10,000 ethnographic musicology and American studies in musical ethnography cylinder records held in the Archiv. Since 1906, this is a matter of record. His private letters reveal an effort to exchange had been made possible by a preservation find a reliable preservation medium for sound recordings process Herzog termed "galvanolysis." Original cylinders in order to establish in America a single institution were cast in indestructible copper negatives from which dedicated to the study of the world's music. any number of positive cylinder copies could be made Herzog brought to this task a firm grasp of pertinent available to interested scholars. In 1924, Franz Boas, who issues based on his education under the foremost had periodically sent cylinders recorded by himself and musicologists and anthropologists of the early twentieth his associates to be copied at the Archiv, asked von century. Born on 11 December 1901, in Budapest, he was Hornbostel to send him a student who could be trained the first child and only son of Jewish parents, Otto and to carry out anthropological investigations of American Irene (Baxbaum) Herzog. His father, an amateur violinist Indian music. Von Hornbostel offered the opportunity to and wealthy manager of a local milling company, Herzog and he eagerly accepted, motivated in part by encouraged the son's desire to become a concert pianist. political conditions in Germany at the time. Before The best musicians were engaged for his early education, Herzog could enter Columbia University, he had to take most notably the composer and famed interpreter of the examinations which were denied him in Hungary. In Hungarian folksongs, Bela Bartok. From 1917 to 1919, 1924, Herzog's family moved to Serbia, and Herzog took George Herzog studied at the Royal Academy of Music in the exams in the Yugoslav language. In 1925, George Budapest, where his respect for the creative potential of Herzog began graduate study in anthropology at folk music was furthered in composition classes offered Columbia University. by Zoltan Kodaly. Unfortunately, the anti-Semitic Admiral It was an auspicious time to enter America's most Nicholas Horthy rose to power in Hungary in 1920, and influential community of anthropologists. Educated by Herzog was prevented from taking the examinations Boas and Ruth Benedict, Herzog's colleagues-Margaret which qualified students for university admission. He Mead, Melville Herskovits, Ruth Bunzel, Thelma then went to Vienna to study at the Academy of Music. Adamson, Alexander Lesser, Gene Weltfish, Melville After one year, he became dissatisfied with his progress Jacobs, Gladys Reichard-were formulating field methods and transferred to the Hochschule fur Musik in Berlin, and theoretical positions that would shape the course of where he studied "exotic" musical instruments with Curt modern anthropology. Herzog's studies in musicology Sachs and African languages with Diederich Westermann. were a natural complement to the rising interest in Indian dramatically your contributions facilitate the Archives' From the Director operations. On the subject of donations, construction of the new facilities for the Archives will be completed in February, Fifty years ago, George Herzog requested and received and we will be moving this spring. While I hope to obtain funds from Franz Boas to purchase equipment for what some new laboratory equipment from the administration would become the Archives of Folk and Primitive Music, and grant money, there are some items of used now the Indiana University Archives of Traditional Music. equipment that would be extremely useful to us. Here is This issue documents the role Herzog played in a kind of "wish list" for the new facilities. (1) A Wurlitzer ethnomusicology, and some of the frustrations he (or other model) juke-box in working condition for public encountered (and in some cases caused) as he worked to use, (2) several good quality reel-to-reel tape recorders for put together a professional archive of recorded sound. the listening area (perhaps those of you who are Carol Inman writes about George Herzog's professional switching to cassette or compact disk could donate your life through the early 1950's. Marilyn Graf provides a list old ones), (3) several electric typewriters (perhaps from of the important documentation and transcriptions that those of you who have bought computers). If you have have surfaced as she has sorted through the more than any of these and would like to donate them, please one hundred boxes of papers and books purchased from contact us by letter or telephone. Contributions to Indiana the Herzog estate by Indiana University after his death in University are tax-deductible. 1983. Just as Herzog appealed to many different individuals George Herzog was often frustrated by a lack of funds; and institutions for help in establishing an Archives in institutions did not feel they had sufficient money to the United States, I appeal to you to contribute to it fifty allocate some to preserving sound recordings. While the years later through your support, donations, and Archives of Traditional Music is better funded than ever additions to our collections. before, we count on the generosity of the Friends of the Archives to supplement the budgetary resources. If you did not make a donation last year, please send a contribution now. In a future issue I will describe how esthetics, his associates sought out his advice on field period in anthropology when artifacts were hastily recording, and he was given unrestricted access to the collected from the Indians without regard to their large co ection 0 et nograp ic cylin er records at t-C-::-e--=---":====meaning in social context or how they might be used by American Museum of Natural History (AMNH). the institutions that housed them. Herzog had very There were at the time approximately 10,000 field- definite ideas about how these materials could prove recorded cylinder recordings scattered throughout the valuable to the wider scientific community, and as a first- United States and Canada. More often than not, these year graduate student, he expressed his concern over collections, whether in the hands of private individuals, their mismanagement. museums or universities, were uncataloged and Since the fidelity of a cylinder record lessens in quality neglected. They were the forgotten relics of an earlier every time it is played, Herzog found it unfortunate that cylinders recorded by American scholars had not been copied to ensure the originals "against damages by casualties or by transcription."l He recommended the Resound "galvanolysis" process developed at Berlin, but few A Quarterly of the American institutions had generated enough money or interest to ship their collections overseas. Herzog Archives of Traditional Music lamented the fact that "only a small part of the phonographic collections in the United States [had been] Marilyn B. Graf, Editor conserved by this method."2 It was not until the time of Resound is issued in January, April, July, and October. his first post-doctoral appointment that the recording Comments, letters, and items of interest are welcome and industry in America had sufficiently evolved to allow him may be addressed to the editor. to undertake a systematic preservation of these valuable sound documents. Archives of Traditional Music On 17 January 1933, Herzog, then a research associate Maxwell Hall 057 at Yale's Institute of Human Relations, wrote Charles Indiana University Seeger: Bloomington, Indiana 47405 Since I have come to the U.s.A., I have been thinking (812) 335-8632 of the necessity of establishing a Phonogramm­ Anthony Seeger, Director Archive that would satisfy the interests of the James R. Smart, Acting Associate Director anthropologist, folklorist, musicologist and musician, Brenda L. Nelson, Librarian not to mention the psychologist, etc. Now that Marilyn B. Graf, Secretary recording methods have developed so rapidly, the time seems to be more than ripe for such an ISSN 0749-2472