Golden Record Curation
Voyager’s Golden Record – Fairie Round – cond David Munroe
Fairie Round, to me, is a demonstration of joy and playful wonder that is timeless and its sound. I feel that the enchantment of folklore and the buoyant melodies reminiscent of childhood imagination suggest that humanity is as much a species of dreamers as it is of thinkers. I think that the song’s late medieval/early modern origins serve as a reminder of humanity’s use of music to celebrate and bring people together across centuries, and that the joyful and the magical serve, too, as forms of intelligence and expression.
Voyager’s Golden Record- Melancholy Blues- Louis Armstrong & His Hot Seven
The inclusion of Louis Armstrong’s “Melancholy Blues” is profoundly symbolic, as jazz itself is a genre that emerged from struggle and reinvention. It is the only jazz recording on the Golden Record, and I believe that the genre itself embodies musical freedom, breaking from rigid European classical forms and embracing improvisation and individuality. I think it represents musical freedom and is a necessary participant of the Golden Record.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Men’s house song – Papua New Guinea
This is one of my favourites on the list. The Men’s House song offers a glimpse into the communal life and musical traditions of an underrepresented culture in global media. I appreciate the incorporation of the long overtone flutes and bamboo pipes, and I think it paints an aural portrait of collective experiences and group identity. I think it demonstrates music’s universal role in rituals, traditions and connection, and by sending it into space, it acknowledges that all human societies, no matter how small or remote, possess complex ways of celebrating and expressing through sound.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Beethoven 5th, part 1, Otto Klemperer
Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony manages to capture a wide array of feelings, and I believe its inclusion highlights humanity’s capacity to convey a vast emotional range through auditory means. Classical music also has measurable neurological and emotional effects, stimulating cognition, lowering cortisol levels, and increasing dopamine levels, adding biological depth to artistic creation (Jenkins, 2001).
Voyager’s Golden Record – Panpipes and drum song – Peru
I appreciate that, with the pairing of panpipes and percussion, this song’s inclusion on the Golden Record highlights humanity’s affinity for creatively using natural materials and the universality of music as a collaborative medium. I think there is something definitively human about this song, and I think its inclusion acknowledges the contributions of Indigenous South American culture to the global creative narrative and helps portray humanity’s diversity alongside the other songs of the Golden Record.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Jaat Kahan Ho – India – Surshri
“Jaat Kahan Ho” is a beautiful piece of Hindustani classical music, with a unique melodic structure and distinct vocals that set it apart from many of the other songs on this list. The title roughly translates to “Where are you going, lone girl?”, evoking themes of solitude, yearning, and the passage into the unknown and the lonely, not too different from what one would imagine travelling across the vast, silent expanse would be like.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Izlel ye Delyo Haydutin – Bulgaria
“Izlel ye Delyo Haydutin” is an incredibly striking song on first listen, with powerful vocals and the resonant drone of the Gaida creating a haunting yet defiant presence throughout. The song tells the story of Delyo, a rebel leader who fought against the forced Islamization of the Bulgarians by the Ottomans. The history and story it tells make it one of the most impactful songs on the Golden Record, a testament to cultural endurance and resistance that it carries as it travels into space.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Wedding song – Peru
This Peruvian wedding song presents a female voice with no instrumental accompaniment, standing out for its raw intimacy and authenticity. Without instrumentation, the human voice becomes our most fundamental and expressive instrument. It is a tender and poignant song that conveys the personal and communal significance of marriage and union. It feels to me like one of the least “performed” songs on the record; it is as if she is singing to herself or to someone she loves. Its presence in the record contributes to a fuller portrait of humanity’s emotional spectrum and musical diversity with its simplicity, providing a glimpse into everyday humanity.
Voyager’s Golden Record -Morning Star and Devil Bird- Australia
“Morning Star and Devil Bird” is a traditional Indigenous song from Australia, with layered vocalization and deep timbres, creating a connection on the record to oral histories and ritual storytelling through sound. “Morning Star” refers to the Barnumbirr morning star ceremonies, which relate to the clan’s relationship to land through ancestral spirits and the journey of the souls of the dead to the land of the morning star (Gorman, 2013). In the context of the Golden Record, it mirrors humanity’s own voyage into the unknown, bringing with us our ancestry into the vastness of space.
Voyager’s Golden Record – Mozart – Queen of the Night- Eda Moser
The “Queen of the Night” aria, performed by Eda Moser, is an awe-inspiring example of one of the most technically demanding genres of vocalization in music and one of the most famous performances in classical opera. The music itself is dramatic with various highs and lows throughout the song. Including opera music is a necessity on the Golden Record, in my opinion, not only for its technical impressiveness but also for the physical reaction it elicits in listeners, with opera music eliciting autonomic arousal and positive emotions in the audience, making a fitting introduction for the extraterrestrial to human auditory creations (Balteş, Avram, Miclea, & Miu, 2011). It represents the skill of the individual and celebrates the human capacity to create awe.
References
Balteş, F. R., Avram, J., Miclea, M., & Miu, A. C. (2011). Emotions induced by operatic music: psychophysiological effects of music, plot, and acting: a scientist’s tribute to Maria Callas. Brain and cognition, 76(1), 146–157. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bandc.2011.01.012
Gorman, A. (2013) Beyond the Morning Star: The real tale of the voyager’s Aboriginal music. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/beyond-the-morning-star-the-real-tale-of-the-voyagers-aboriginal-music-18288
Jenkins J. S. (2001). The Mozart effect. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 94(4), 170–172. https://doi.org/10.1177/014107680109400404