Don Walter reveals his trick for recording double voices

March 25, 2019 at 8:21 pm, No comments

In this recent interview he sheds some light on the "Lo-Fi overdubs" that we've found on one of his cassettes.

In the early 1980s "Mr. Gavitt" developed a simple trick to add a second voice to some of his recordings, using a second tape recorder for playback. In this interview the 99-year old "King of home recording" remembers how he had surprised Paula Palmer, the author of "Wa' apin man" - a book about the Afrocaribbean Culture in Talamanca - with the resulting double voices. He also recalls a particular incident, where he had himself quite confused by trying to record a third voice on top of all that.

Now, what you hear at the end of this clip is a noisy but stunningly beautiful, two voiced version of "Monilia". We have found this gem on Tapes coming from Costa Rica. So far, we could rescue only one other example of his overdub experiments. According to the man himself, he did record quite a few, sometimes adding a second voice, whistling or percussion. Of course we are hoping to find some of these overdub sessions with the invaluable help of our supporters - so thank you for sharing!

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Wa' apin, man? What happened?

Recovered treasures

In 2017, nine original tapes were located in Canada:

In 2018, six original tapes were found in Costa Rica:

In March 2019, five original tapes were recovered in the USA:

In May 2019, unreleased parts from Don Walter's "Folkways" album were donated to the Tape Hunt:

In January 2020, another five original tapes were found in Costa Rica:

In October 2020, the biggest catch containing 45 original tapes was unearthed in Costa Rica:

Available music albums

Currently Vol. 1 & 2 of the "Legendary Tape Recordings" are available - containing 30 previously unreleased Calypso treasures rescued by the Tape Hunt :