Audio pioneer Henry Trentman of Maryland founded Recorded Books (RBI) in 1979. Trentman was a salesman, on the road for hours, with no content to feed his mind. According to The Washington Post, he sought out an actor "willing to read a book, which he would tape. Frank Muller responded, and recorded The Sea Wolf by Jack London, Trentman's first production." At a time when eight-track tape technology was fading, and cassette players were not in every vehicle, Trentman's idea of listening to books proved him to be a visionary.
Recorded Books now celebrates more than 25 years in business and is owned by Haights Cross Communication. The "heard word" market is a more crowded field. Yet not all audio books are equal in quality.
In a world hungry for quality content, the audio publishing industry continues to enjoy solid double-digit growth (up 12% in 2007) and now tops $1 billion in sales, according to the Audio Publishers Association. Which also reports that digital downloads represent "17% of total sales, up from 6% in 2004, and two-thirds (64%) of all listeners own an MP3 player. We continue to be an affluent community that reads voraciously . . . and unabridged is the overwhelming favorite at 78% of sales, up from 71% in 2006."
Time will tell with new delivery formats for audio books and content - the cell phone market and other devices may well prove to be new market opportunities.
Producer John Nebel and the lively staff (inside the state-of-the-art location high above busy Broadway in New York) diligently shepherd work from printed materials through the recording process, checking pronunciations of dialect, foreign terms, oddball phrases, and editing out such items as the rustle of paper or stomach rumbles.
George Guidall helps create the magic at Recorded Books studio.
