Wednesday, March 29, 2023

ALL the Houdini wax cylinder audio has been saved!

This is news that I've long dreamed of being able to report. This may be the biggest news I've ever reported here on WILD ABOUT HARRY. Little did I dream that I would play a role in this moment of Houdini history, but a role I did play! But to share this news right, I need to tell the whole story.

One of the great treasures inside David Copperfield's International Museum and Library of the Conjuring Arts in Las Vegas are the original wax cylinders containing the only known recordings of Houdini's voice. These were discovered in 1970, and only two of the three Houdini cylinders were ever transferred to a playable media. (Only a short clip has ever been released.) The cylinder said to contain Houdini and his sister Gladys reading poetry written by their father was never transferred and has not been heard since 1970. There are also five other cylinders in the collection with no record of what's on them. So there's still a lot of mystery surrounding these cylinders.

For the past two weeks I've been doing work and research inside the museum. I shared some of my adventures here. But I was keeping a secret this whole time. Mike Caveney was also at the museum. Years ago Mike and I pitched David on the idea of making new digital transfers of all the wax cylinders. The purpose was to finally hear the fabled poetry cylinder, document what's on the mystery cylinders, and digitally preserve all the recordings for the future. David tasked us with investigating how this could be done safely.

It's been a long journey, years in fact, but all roads lead to Dr. Michael Khanchalian, aka "The Cylinder Doctor," who just happens to live 20 minutes from Mike. Not only can Michael repair damaged cylinders, but he has developed a player that can safely play old recordings. He was clearly the man for the job. So we once again pitched the idea to David.

Any reluctance on David's part was understandable. He has the original cylinders and the original tape transfers from 1970 (which, ironically, may no longer be playable), so why risk damaging the cylinders or discovering they had gone bad or, worse, that some slippery collector in the 1970s had pulled a switcheroo and he actually owned nothing. The value of these cylinders could be wiped out entirely. But David Copperfield is dedicated to preserving magic history, and if there was a chance of capturing a new piece of Houdini's voice, he would take the risk. He gave us the go-ahead and trusted us to get the job done.

Lifting the heavy glass off the display case in the museum to retrieve the cylinders was pretty nerve-wracking. And it was about to get worse. Mike had left the museum by the time all the arrangements had been made, so it fell to me to bring the cylinders to Los Angeles. Without revealing what I was doing to anyone besides those in the museum, I loaded all eight cylinders into my car and made the trek back to LA, battling a three-hour traffic jam and two hellacious downpours along the way. But I made it!


The next day (March 16, 2023) Mike and I arrived at Michael Khanchalian's beautiful home. He has an amazing collection of players and cylinders and is clearly an expert and enthusiast in this field. "He's the John Cox of wax cylinders," joked Mike. After a fabulous tour of his collection, we got down to work in his "lab."


The first three cylinders, which had come from David's vault and were labeled as containing Houdini's voice, did not contain Houdini's voice. Michael knew this instantly as he could tell they were commercial recordings and not the type of "blank" cylinders one would use for recording. Instead what we heard were vaudevillians Will Oakland ("When You and I Were Young, Maggie"), Billy Murray & Ada Jones ("Whistling Coquette") and a musical march (Queen of Sheeba). It was fun to hear these sounds from the past, but it was a little disconcerting, and the switcheroo theory was dancing in my head. But we still had five cylinders to go.

The cylinder labeled "Pa's Poems" (in Houdini's handwriting) was up next. Michael was encouraged by what he saw. At least this was the correct type of "blank" cylinder. This was the moment of truth. Houdini history was about to be made, for better or worse.


Michael slid the cylinder on his player, carefully calibrated the needle, hit the record button (we were making direct transfers to CD, no computers or hard drives involved), and lowered the needle. Then this happened.


Houdini's powerful voice boomed out over the room in a recording that had not been heard in 53 years. He introduces "an original German recitation" of poetry written by his father, "Reverend Doctor Mayer Samuel Weiss," to be spoken by his sister, "C. Gladys Weiss." There is a fantastic candid moment when Houdini is about to state his father's birthday and he has to ask Gladys, "What was the year?" It's very faint, but it's there, and we all looked at each other in delighted disbelief at what we had just heard.

Gladys then recites the poem in German. Gladys was blind, so she's doing this from memory. As Houdini says on the recording, the poem was "taught to her" by their father. I believe she makes a mistake and starts over after a small gap in the recording. Houdini then comes back on and says he will repeat the poem "in case you did not understand it." This seems to be his true speaking voice and not the "presentational" voice he uses on the other recordings. He then proceeds to recite the poem also in German. He speaks faster and, to my ear, more confidently in German, with great flair and rolling R's. Gladys signs off with the date, October 30, 1914, which is a day after the other recordings were made. The fact that this recording was made on a different day has never been documented.

Next up were the two full recordings of Houdini's Water Torture Cell patter. As with the poetry cylinder, each of these run just over four minutes. The quality of these transfers is much clearer than what exists currently. For years I believed Houdini says "I, Houdini" as his sign off. I've been wrong. "Harry Houdini" is now sparkling clear. There was also a big surprise waiting at the end of the first speech. After Houdini signs off, the cylinder seems to end. But then Gladys comes back on and "certifies" that she heard her brother "make this record" on October 29, 1914. This certification was never transferred in 1970 nor have I ever seen any mention of it. It's possible it was missed or the machine they used couldn't pick it up.

Speaking of the machine(s) from the 1970s, our expert Michael said he was amazed the recordings weren't destroyed back then, as you can't play these Edison Blanks on a regular machine. They are much softer and the weight of the needle can wipe them clean. Several times he said it was miraculous that the recordings survive and in such great fidelity.

The final two cylinders were commercial recordings of German songs. It was still exciting to hear these as all the cylinders belonged to Houdini and it's wild to hear the music he played at home for pleasure.

Over the next few days I prepared notes and transcriptions of all the cylinders and reunited them with their correct cases. I was helped in this by magician Jessica Jane Peterson who became the fourth lucky person to hear the poetry recording.


I then drove the cylinders back to Las Vegas and played the new recordings for David. He was thrilled by what he heard. He instantly picked up on all the same moments that had so excited us in LA, especially the moment when we hear Houdini's more natural speaking voice. Even before the recordings ended he was working on the next steps. Audio work will be done to clean up the recordings and the German will be translated. It was mission accomplished and everyone was delighted and relieved!

I took myself out to dinner that night and thought about what had happened. Not only had I finally heard the "Pa's Poems" cylinder, but I now understood it was always the most precious and personal recording of them all. Houdini loved and and honored his father and you can hear that. He loved his sister and you can hear that. The family language was German and you hear that. If Houdini ever came back, this would be the cylinder he would want to hear. Preserving it was more important than I ever understood. I felt like I had done a service for both Houdini and David Copperfield, and I was overwhelmed with gratitude at the amount of trust that had been placed in me.

I then sent David a text with one last request. Could I share this momentous news? His response came back quickly: "Sure."

As I said, David didn't need to do this. This headline could have easily read, "The Houdini wax cylinders are no more." But this is what makes David Copperfield a titan of magic. He took the risk, extended extraordinary trust, and now deserves the credit for saving this important piece of Houdini history. Maybe even the most important piece. When and where the general public might hear these I can't say. But the fact that we can now hear them was the purpose of this incredible journey.


Thanks to David Copperfield, Mike Caveney, Michael Khanchalian, Jessica Jane Peterson, Glenda Wellendorf, and everyone who helped bring Houdini (and Gladys Weiss) back to life. 

Want more? You can view additional images from this adventure as a "Scholar" member of my Patreon by clicking below.

49 comments:

  1. This is the most exciting Houdini news I have heard in a long time. WOW. I'm jealous, speechless, thrilled, overwhelmed and more. So glad you were a part of it. I can't imagine the pressure of carefully transferring these cylinders from one location to the next. But then, to hear Houdini's voice....the real one, not the showbiz voice, OMG, what an enormous thrilll that must have been. Congratulations to all on a job well done!

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    1. Thanks Dean! Yeah, transporting those cylinders. When Mike first told me I would need to do so, I was like, "Absolutely not!" But it was clear this wouldn't happen unless I did so, so I was on deck!

      Houdini's regular voice isn't really all that different from his showbiz voice. He still speaks every word and syllable in that halting manner. But it's faster and more natural. His German is really interesting. I can't wait to hear an assessment of it from someone who speaks German.

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  2. John, your blog doesn't just REPORT Houdini news and history - it CAUSES Houdini news and history to happen. This is absolutely breathtaking (as perfectly illustrated in the photos of you shown here)! Many congratulations to all involved!

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  3. That is so fecking cool!!!

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    1. Haha. Thanks Ted! Now you know why I've been AWOL for two weeks. :)

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  4. Awesome, John! Thank you for sharing.

    I work in micro-CT and it looks like an application that I would be interested in. A 3D x-ray scan at micron-resolution would provide you with a digital copy of items such as this, that can be 3D printed or posted online in 3D.

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    1. It's just audio, so not sure what there would be to 3D print. But thanks!

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    2. Oh, I understand what you are saying now. 3D print new cylinders themselves. That's a pretty great idea.

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  5. Are there copies of these recordings available ??? PLEASE

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    1. Not at the moment, but hopefully someday. It took 25 years for us to finally hear of clip from the 1970 transfers.

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  6. All of your years of devotion have certainly paid off. You are not just reporting on Houdini history you are helping discover that history. Bravo!

    Perry from NJ.

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  7. It always bothered me when people would ridicule Houdini’s speaking voice, because they don’t realize that you had to emphasize every syllable, and basically yell into the microphone to make a recording in those days. If you listen to other recordings from other people made in that time, you will notice that they speak in the same manner. Can’t wait to hear these new ones!

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    1. He certainly knew how to project his voice. It's loud and clear. When Gladys steps up to the horn, it's only half as loud. She is also carefully enunciating.

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    2. As I've noted elsewhere, Houdini's manner of speech reminded me of when 82 years old Pete Kortes told me when he was 9 years old, of watching Buffalo Bill address his audience, without electronic amplification, speaking de lib er at ly...letting each syl la ble, enough time and space to reach the top bal con ey.

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  8. I know Jay Marshall owned at least one cylinder record of Houdini speaking, and ive herd it before. are these new ones? This is a great find. Will they be published/available for use to hear?

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    1. I believe what Jay Marshall owned was a copy of the 1970 transfer. A few of those were made for collectors. As far as I know, all the original cylinders themselves remained in the John Mulholland collection. DC bought the collection in 1991.

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  9. This is fantastic news and a great story.
    It was my understanding that the Houdini family spoke Yiddish, which is a mixture of Hebrew and German. Yiddish would have been the main language in Hungary at the time for those of the Jewish faith.
    If needed, I have a Yiddish dictionary from 1909 which was standard issue to many new immigrants at Ellis Island and other entry ports that you may certainly borrow.
    I could be wrong about the family speaking German, but I recall a story about one of the Medium's speaking to Houdini and his mother's words were recited to him.
    He said something to the effect that it was strange that his mother would state these words as she "only spoke Yiddish"!

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    1. Check out this post. According to Bess, they didn't speak Yiddish. They were all German speakers. So was Bessie's family.

      The only mama language from a medium disconnect I'm aware is was the Doyle seance. She wrote in English and Houdini pointed out that she wrote in German.

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    2. You may be thinking of the ‘53 movie.

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  10. This is so incredibly exciting! Thank you!

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  11. Extremely exciting! I saw an articles that I own in Popular Science 1927 that had both Houdini and Edison interviews. I still manufacture the blank cylinders, and some museums purchase them to preserve Native American and other language projects, to this day, I am sure some machines and cylinder would survive even if civilization is lost.

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    1. These things hold up! As I said in the post, the magnetic tape transfer from 1970 might now be unplayable as tape does go bad. Even CDs go bad.

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  12. My mind is blown…..maybe a great addition for Magic live !!!

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  13. Great news!

    BTW, for future cylinders, check out tge possibility of using a laser to read them with no contact. https://www.google.com/search?q=laser+reading+wax+cylinder+recordings

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    1. DC loved that technology! But the problem was it would have involved shipping the cylinders back east, and that wasn't going to happen. Also, as I talked to experts, most seemed to agree that you still get the best recording from a stylus. And with these modern players, it's perfectly safe.

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  14. So how can we actually HEAR them?

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  15. Wow! Just...Wow!

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  16. It was the right decision to get those cylinders transfered to digital, and find out what's on them. If a switcheroo was pulled years ago, nobody would know. The cylinders would still be in the showcase believed to be preserving Houdini material.

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    1. Indeed, it was great to get it all sorted and separate the three Houdini cylinders from the others. They had all been mixed up over the years. I also noted some distinctive features on the Houdini cylinders, especially the poetry cylinder, that makes them identifiable on sight. Not that there's any danger of switcheroo now, but it's good to know we can confirm them without playing them.

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    2. Absolutely! The identified Houdini cylinders can be returned to the showcase in his museum. I suppose DC might want keep the other duds. Or ship them out somewhere?

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    3. The others aren't duds. They all belonged to Houdini and most have Houdini's handwriting on the cases. They are also historic recordings in their own right.

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    4. Understood! I didn't know HH owned the other cylinders that don't have his voice on them.

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  17. I would have been shaking in my boots if I was given the sole responsibility of transporting these priceless and one-of-a-kind treasures to and from Los Angeles. I would have insisted on a police & military escort! Fantastic teamwork by all involved - to preserve these recordings for this, and future generations.

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  18. This is an astounding achievement! Congratulations! And I hope you'll eventually post the audio on a website, so we can all hear it.

    But there is something I do wonder about. You wrote, "David didn't need to do this. This headline could have easily read, 'The Houdini wax cylinders are no more.'" As far back as the mid-1980s, I remember some enterprising grad students worked on a way use laser light to read the waveform from the height of the plastic in the canyons of the grooves of LP records. It wasn't a saleable product because by that time CDs were taking over from LPs. But it did have the advantage that the signal could be extracted from an LP without anything making physical contact with the LP, and thus avoid the danger of damaging the medium on which the waveform was recorded. I'm surprised that in all the time you've been working on this you've never come across any enterprising students who'd be interested in creating a similar device for wax cylinders, and thus avoid the risk of damaging the medium.

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    1. That technology exists and DC was interested. But we would have needed to ship the cylinders back east and we didn't want to do that. As I talked to experts, most seemed to agree that you get the best recording from a stylus. And with these modern players, it's perfectly safe. The danger wasn't in the playing. The danger was in discovering that the cylinders had been destroyed in their attempts to play them on old machines in the 1970s.

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  19. This is amazing! Like some of the others above I’m dying to one day hear the cylinders too! As I was reading your post, I couldn’t help but imagine how you must have felt driving with the cylinders in your possession. It must have been like having HH riding in the backseat of your car! Great work to all involved, and especially you, John. Congratulations. And thanks!

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    1. Thank you Anon. I took no pleasure in having them in my car! I felt the enormous weight of responsibility. But I calmed down in time and hardly thought about them on my drive back. I was very happy when I carried them back inside the museum.

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  20. John, you've really outdone yourself this time (yet again)! Huge congratulations to you and everyone involved! I couldn't help but think as I read this (although the thought frankly feels like a bit of a sacrilege) that AI technology could, in theory, replicate Houdini's voice as he reads from his books or even performs his act (probably even using just the snippet of his voice that's currently available to the public). And of course produce his moving image to go with it. But it would still just be a fabrication for the sake of curiosity. Unlocking these cylinders that Houdini owned is a truly remarkable "find" and revelation, and it's wonderful David Copperfield was so generous as to make it all possible. Thanks so much for sharing this fantastic news (and for being a safe driver)!

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    1. Thanks Tom! Using AI is an interesting idea. I've often thought Houdini's voice could be dubbed into some of his silent movies. There's a moment in The Man From Beyond when he says, "Balcom, you lie!" and you can absolutely read his lips. So we know the exact speed at which he's speaking. If you could AI generate this line from elements of these voice recordings, we could maybe create a moment of sync sound Houdini film! Heck, maybe at some point we could do an entire movie.

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    2. Wouldn't that be awesome?! Hopefully, it's just a matter of time!

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  21. Are there early recordings of any other magician's voices in the collection or elsewhere that would be of interest but have never been transferred?

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  22. Allowing my audiences to actually hear a portion of HOUDINI speaking to them would add to my portrayal of HOUDINI. It would provide the audience to visually imagine in their mind seeing HOUDINI standing there(looking at a HOUDINI picture of mine)and hearing his actual voice. Place these recordings on a CD and create a nice pamphlet in its case discussing the background of it, HOUDINI, his sister, DC, your participation in restoring its recordings, etc. I am prepared to have a copy to allow others to learn and hear of its important significance to the legendary HOUDINI.
    Benjilini as Houdini:
    MAGIC-ESCAPES-SCAMS EXPOSED

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    1. You can still do that with the Houdini voice audio that's currently available, Benjilini. :)

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  23. Wow! Stunning! Bravissimo! Do you agree that's a "Wisconsin-German" accent in English?

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    1. Not sure I would recognize a "Wisconsin-German" accent. He has an accent, but I can't tell what it is. To me it's just "Houdini voice." :)

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