full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Alexis Charpentier: How record collectors find lost music and preserve our cultural heritage

Unscramble the Blue Letters


I'll tell you a story that for me sort of sums up the value of the work of rcroed diggers. The sorty of a brilliant Montreal musician and cmseoopr. Henri-Pierre Noël was born and raised in Haiti, but he lived briefly in the US and in Belgium. He pesasd through Montreal what was supposed to be for two weeks, but he ended up staying for the next 40 yares. When he was young, he learned to play piano and deeelvopd a very particular way of playing his instrument: very fast and almost like a percussion. His style was a mix of his Haitian influences and folklore meixd with the American influences that he grew up hearing. So he creetad a mix of compas mixed with funk and jazz. As a young man, he pylead and toured with live bdnas in the US and in Europe, but had never recorded an album or a song before moving to Canada. It was in Montreal in 1979 that he released his first abulm called, "Piano." cplteomely on his own, on Henri-Pierre Noël Records. He only made what he could afford: 2,000 copies of the record. The record received a little bit of airplay, a little bit of support in Canada and in Haiti, but without a big label behind it, it was very, very difficult. Back then, if your record wasn't getting played on mainstream radio, if you weren't in jukeboxes or if you weren't intvied to play on TV, the odds were completely against you. Releasing an album as an iddenenpnet artist was so much more difficult than it is tdoay, both in terms of being heard and just distributing the thing. So, soon after, he released a second album, kept a busy schedule playing piano in various clubs in the city, but his records started to alutmccaue dust slowly. And those 2,000 copies in the span of 30 years easily started to get lost until only a few cipoes in the world remained.

Open Cloze


I'll tell you a story that for me sort of sums up the value of the work of ______ diggers. The _____ of a brilliant Montreal musician and ________. Henri-Pierre Noël was born and raised in Haiti, but he lived briefly in the US and in Belgium. He ______ through Montreal what was supposed to be for two weeks, but he ended up staying for the next 40 _____. When he was young, he learned to play piano and _________ a very particular way of playing his instrument: very fast and almost like a percussion. His style was a mix of his Haitian influences and folklore _____ with the American influences that he grew up hearing. So he _______ a mix of compas mixed with funk and jazz. As a young man, he ______ and toured with live _____ in the US and in Europe, but had never recorded an album or a song before moving to Canada. It was in Montreal in 1979 that he released his first _____ called, "Piano." __________ on his own, on Henri-Pierre Noël Records. He only made what he could afford: 2,000 copies of the record. The record received a little bit of airplay, a little bit of support in Canada and in Haiti, but without a big label behind it, it was very, very difficult. Back then, if your record wasn't getting played on mainstream radio, if you weren't in jukeboxes or if you weren't _______ to play on TV, the odds were completely against you. Releasing an album as an ___________ artist was so much more difficult than it is _____, both in terms of being heard and just distributing the thing. So, soon after, he released a second album, kept a busy schedule playing piano in various clubs in the city, but his records started to __________ dust slowly. And those 2,000 copies in the span of 30 years easily started to get lost until only a few ______ in the world remained.

Solution


  1. developed
  2. mixed
  3. years
  4. invited
  5. album
  6. accumulate
  7. today
  8. independent
  9. composer
  10. record
  11. copies
  12. completely
  13. created
  14. played
  15. bands
  16. story
  17. passed

Original Text


I'll tell you a story that for me sort of sums up the value of the work of record diggers. The story of a brilliant Montreal musician and composer. Henri-Pierre Noël was born and raised in Haiti, but he lived briefly in the US and in Belgium. He passed through Montreal what was supposed to be for two weeks, but he ended up staying for the next 40 years. When he was young, he learned to play piano and developed a very particular way of playing his instrument: very fast and almost like a percussion. His style was a mix of his Haitian influences and folklore mixed with the American influences that he grew up hearing. So he created a mix of compas mixed with funk and jazz. As a young man, he played and toured with live bands in the US and in Europe, but had never recorded an album or a song before moving to Canada. It was in Montreal in 1979 that he released his first album called, "Piano." Completely on his own, on Henri-Pierre Noël Records. He only made what he could afford: 2,000 copies of the record. The record received a little bit of airplay, a little bit of support in Canada and in Haiti, but without a big label behind it, it was very, very difficult. Back then, if your record wasn't getting played on mainstream radio, if you weren't in jukeboxes or if you weren't invited to play on TV, the odds were completely against you. Releasing an album as an independent artist was so much more difficult than it is today, both in terms of being heard and just distributing the thing. So, soon after, he released a second album, kept a busy schedule playing piano in various clubs in the city, but his records started to accumulate dust slowly. And those 2,000 copies in the span of 30 years easily started to get lost until only a few copies in the world remained.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
record digging 5
record collectors 4
record diggers 3
record stores 2
music archaeologists 2
record digger 2
record sleeve 2
mainstream music 2


Important Words


  1. accumulate
  2. airplay
  3. album
  4. american
  5. artist
  6. bands
  7. belgium
  8. big
  9. bit
  10. born
  11. briefly
  12. brilliant
  13. busy
  14. called
  15. canada
  16. city
  17. clubs
  18. compas
  19. completely
  20. composer
  21. copies
  22. created
  23. developed
  24. difficult
  25. diggers
  26. distributing
  27. dust
  28. easily
  29. ended
  30. europe
  31. fast
  32. folklore
  33. funk
  34. grew
  35. haiti
  36. haitian
  37. heard
  38. hearing
  39. independent
  40. influences
  41. invited
  42. jazz
  43. jukeboxes
  44. label
  45. learned
  46. live
  47. lived
  48. lost
  49. mainstream
  50. man
  51. mix
  52. mixed
  53. montreal
  54. moving
  55. musician
  56. noël
  57. odds
  58. passed
  59. percussion
  60. piano
  61. play
  62. played
  63. playing
  64. radio
  65. raised
  66. received
  67. record
  68. recorded
  69. records
  70. released
  71. releasing
  72. remained
  73. schedule
  74. slowly
  75. song
  76. sort
  77. span
  78. started
  79. staying
  80. story
  81. style
  82. sums
  83. support
  84. supposed
  85. terms
  86. today
  87. toured
  88. tv
  89. weeks
  90. work
  91. world
  92. years
  93. young