Albert Brand’s story is tragic. A self-made man, he was able to retire from his first career as a stockbroker when he was only 39-years-old and begin a second career as an ornithologist. As a student at Cornell he developed an interest in the fledgling science of recording birdsong, which led him to publish two pioneering books, Songs of Wild Birds, published in 1934 which included two small 78-rpm phonograph disks and, in 1936, More Songs of Wild Birds, containing three disks and 43 bird songs. (I have a copy of the second.)
Cornell's Arthur Allen writes in the foreword, "In this volume of bird songs another step has been made in overcoming the limitations of the phonograph disk in reducing the high frequencies of bird voices, and the improvement of these records over those which first appeared in Songs of Wild Birds is most encouraging."
"It is Mr. Brand's plan to continue recording the songs and calls of North American birds, and I am sure the nature lovers the country over will look forward with keen anticipation to the appearance of each new volume and each set of records."
Because Brand had money, he helped plan and finance the 1935 Cornell Expedition and would have accompanied Allen, Kellogg and Tanner all the way but his health collapsed. That must have been heartbreaking, to be on the threshold of such a great adventure, and not be able to go. Brand’s name perhaps would have become synonymous with recorded birdsong, he was already on the forefront with two books published and a third on the way. But he did not live to complete any other projects; his health never improved and he died of kidney disease on March 28, 1940. He was only 51-years-old.
