10/04/16 First Session - Posted on 2016-10-10 by Tiquan Marshall

First day was pretty cool, my mentor and I went through the first chapter of the textbook and he help me understand things I was unsure about. As we talked about sound and the history of human recording, my mentor showed me a video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bgXH7U2Ja0) of the first talking toy doll created by Thomas Edison. Which sounded like a scene from a horror film but I found it quite interesting. That then led to us discussing the cylinder phonograph, which is one of the earliest devices used to record and playback human audio. My mentor even showed me a real life Thomas Edison gold moulded record packaging. At first glance it looked like a tea packaging, but to realize what I was holding was something that was used in the late 1800s to record music. It made me realize how far we’ve really come in audio and how much goes into creating music. Such as timbre which is something my mentor went in depth about. As an example he told me about stradivarius violins, which is said to be the one of the finest violins ever created. I was stunned to learn that quite a few of them have been sold for millions of dollars because of their distinct sound. My first class made me realize how valuable the human ears are and my mentor let me know that it’s all downhill from here as far as hearing goes. He told me I should protect my ears as much as I can and to invest in some quality ear plugs like Hearos. As we finished reviewing the chapter he played me a few tracks and even showed me some more cool things. I found his studio to be a comfortable place and I can’t wait to gain more knowledge about audio and its creation.