NEWS: Making Waves – A Festival of Sound @ Discovery Museum

Image: The Gramaphone – TWCMS 1999.1936

With Making Waves, Newcastle’s Discovery Museum celebrates the long history of sound recording, reviving some of the local histories and life stories etched on wax cylinders, gramophone discs or magnetic tapes. A virtual exhibition on Google Arts & Culture enables visitors to listen for the first time to a selection of defining moments in Tyneside’s turbulent 20^th Century, ranging from King George V’s speech at the opening of the Tyne Bridge in 1928 to locals animatedly discussing the Miners’ Strike in 1984. These uniquely poignant documents – alongside many others – were digitised by Tyne & Wear Archives as part of the British Library’s Unlocking Our Sound Heritage project.

Online exhibits are complemented by new interactive panels at Discovery Museum itself, showcasing a range of sound-making objects including record players and car horns (for visitors to experience on their smart devices). Museum manager Carolyn Ball muses: “We wanted to provide our visitors with a new way of experiencing the museum. Recent times have prompted more online creativity and the Unlocking Our Sound Heritage project is the perfect way to explore ways to do this, both online and in person in the galleries.”

New digital recordings will be made during the course of the exhibition – capturing the sound of contemporary Tyneside for future generations.

Making Waves: A Festival of Sound is at Discovery Museum, Newcastle from Monday 20^th September-Sunday 27^th March 2022