| Electronic Voice Phenomena or EVP |
| From an article written on About.com |
| A Short history... 1920's: It is not generally known that in the 1920's Thomas Edison tried to invent a machine that would communicate with the dead. Thinking this was possible, he wrote: "if our personality survives, then it is strictly logical or scientific to assume that it retains memory, intellect, other faculties, and knowledge that we acquire on this earth. Therefore...if we can evolve an intrument so delicate as to be affected by our personality as it survives in the next life, such an instrument, when made available, ought to record something." Edison never succeeded with the invention, obviously, but it seems he did believe that it might be possible to capture disembodied voices with a machine. 1930's: In 1939, Attila Von Szalay, an American photographer, experimented with a phonograph record cutter in trying to capture spirit voices. It's said that he achieved some success with this method and got even better results in later years using a wire recorder. In the late 1950's, the results of this experiment were documented in an article for the American Society of Physical Research. 1940's: In the late 1940's, Marcello Bacci of Grosseto, Italy claimed to be able to pick up voices of the deceased on a vacuum tube radio. 1950's: In 1952, two Catholic priests, Father Emetti and Father gemelli, inadvertently picked up EVP while recording Gregorian chants on a magnetophone. When the wire on the machine kept breaking, Father Gemelli looked to the heavens and asked his dead father for help. To the shock of both men, his father's voice was heard on the recording saying, "Of course I shall help you. I'm always with you." Further experiments confirmed the phenomenon. In 1959, Friedrich Juergenson, a Swedish film producer, was recording bird songs. On his playback, he could discern his mother's voice saying in German, "Friedrich, you are being watched. Friedel, my little Friedel, can you hear me?" His subsequent recording of hundreds of such voices would earn him the title "the Father of EVP." He wrote two books on the subject: Voices from the Universe and Radio Contact with the Dead. 1960's: Juergenson's work came to the attention of a Latvian psychologist named Dr. Konstantin Raudive. At first skeptical, raudive began his own experiments in 1967. He too recorded the voice of his deceased mother saying, "Kostulit, this is mother." Kostulit was the boyhood name she always called him. He recorded thousands of EVP voices. 1970's and 80's: Spiritual researchers George and Jeanette Meek joined forces with psychic William O'Neil and recorded hundreds of hours of EVP recordings using radio oscillators. They allegedly wereable to capture conversations with the spirit of Dr. George Jeffries Mueller, a dead university professor and Nasa scientist. 1990's to Present: EVP continues to be experimented with by a number of individuals, organizations and ghost research societies. What is Electronic Voice Phenomena? Electronic Voice Phenomena or EVP, is a mysterious event in which human sounding voices from an unknown source are heard on recording tape, in radio station noise and other electronic media. Most often, EVP's have been captured on audiotape. The mysterious voices are not heard at the time of the recording, it is only heard while being played back. Sometimes amplification and noise filtering is required to hear the voices. How you can do it... Anyone can experiment with EVP. You don't need expensive equipment, special knowldge or psychic abilities. All you need is a taperecorder, new, previously unused audio tapes, and perhaps a good quantity of patience. You can try and pick up EVP by recording radio "white noise" or directly by recording sound at a location such as a cemetery or old house. Most researchers suggest using a cassette recorder that has a remote microphone; that is, one that connects to the recorder by wire. This is preferred to an in-machine condenser microphone on the recorder because that kind of microphone is more likely to pick up motor noises of the machine itself. Buy name-brand audio cassettes to ensue quality. Tapes that are labled "normal" are fine, but many researchers recommend using tapes that are marked "high-bias" for best results. To use the radio method, tune the radio between stations where you can hear only static or "white noise." Be sure there are no distant stations coming through, however faintly. Make sure the room is quiet and free of all noises, that includes people talking in the background, tv's or other radios. To use the direct method, take your equipment to the cemetery or location you wish to record in. Make sure there are no background noises to interfere with the recording. Again, remain quiet during the recording. If your recorder has a counter set it to zero. Begin the recording by announcing the date, location and time. Record for a few minutes. Some researchers say you should even announce that you wish to communicate; ask them to speak to you. You can even ask questions every few minutes or so. Try different spots of a location. Keep a record of where you are at the time of the recording, and what the conter number is. Later you can playback what you have recorded and see if you have captured any EVP. Rewind the tape, of course, and listen carefully to your sessions. You may need to turn up the volume a bit because the voices can be faint at times. You may not succeed the first few times. Don't give up, keep trying, although there is no guarantee of success. When you hear what you think might be an EVP voice, make a note of the counter number so you can easily return to it. Listen carefully to what it might be saying. Be sure you rule out any other explanation, real voices in the background, redio transmissions, etc. Keep a journal of your recordings. Present them or send them to researchers who have had experiences with EVP for their opinions. EVP is fascinating, mysterious and down right worthy of research and experimentation. Go Explore! BACK |