After I sent the mp3 of my voice on an antique Edison cylinder phonograph to golden ladies toastmasters, Toastmaster Trini Ding wrote, "Principal Lin said you are the most courageous one. He didn't know that you are an adventurous person. It reminds me of the movie "My fair Lady". The sound effect is awesome. You sang very well. I believe all the audience was impressed."
At 1:30PM, I visited the exhibition of Retrospective of Studies on Taiwanese Traditional Music at the Central Library. When I saw the antique phonograph and listened to the Viennese waltz, I felt like dancing. At 1:50PM, I walked into the lecture hall, I was amazed at many antique phonographs and hundreds of phonograph records displayed on the table, including the first record of Enrico Caruso a century ago.
Being a historian, Pincipal Lin of Kan Nan High School of Commerce and Indsutry was passionate about his collections of phonographs and records. He talked about the joy whenever he listend to the old records of different times. He brought back the people in the history to life from the records. After he demonstrated the voice representation by antique phonograph, he asked for volunteers from the floor, I raised up my hand without hesitation! How would I miss the once-in-a-lifetime chance?
Due to the length of the waxed cyclinder, Principal told me to experiment for no more than one minute. I thought about O Sole Mio in Italian at first, but I decided to sing Mei Lanfang's most popular Peking opera Susan Under Arrest. It was an exciting experience singing Peking opera to a funnel, I could listen to the echo of my voice as I moved my head closer to the funnel. 【流水】
蘇三離了洪桐縣
將身來在大街前
未曾開言我心內慘
過往的君子聽我言
哪一位去往南京轉
與我那三郎把信傳
言說蘇三把命斷
來生變犬馬我當報還
It was a perfect experiment. I finished the recording in one minute and won a big round of applause from the floor. When Principal Lin played the record, I felt like being transcended to the old Shanghai city in the early 20th century. Only I wish I could have sung better, when Principal Lin told me that he would save the record!
When I got home, my husband read the mp3 of my voice on Goldwave, some waves were beyond the upper limite. He suggested that I should keep a distance from the funnel to have the best acoustic effect. Now I need to do some research on sound wave in physics 101 to calculate the distance.
Of course, I was most thrilled to ask Toastmaster Kate Hsu if I could apply for the apprenticeship with Master Baojiu Mei, the song of Mei Langfan. Toastmaster Kate Hsu complimented that my singing of Chinese Opera was improved. She was happy to see more friends help promote the Chinese opera.
I'm determined to improve my singing skills of Peking opera. I look forward to another chance to document my voice on Edison cylinder phonograph in the future. I'm sure I shall do better next time, only if there is a next time! Who knows, maybe golden ladies can produce a musical play of "My Fair Lady" with an authentic phonograph in the future! It's going to be very challenging to learn the English dialects, though!
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