A Few Fun Questions

Mozartjr · Post by **Mozartjr** » August 28th, 2021, 3:12 pm

Just curious...
Does anyone know--
1. What the longest solo recording is,
2. What the longest collaborative recording is,
3, what the longest dramatic recording is.
4, What the shortest project is.
Let's see if anyone wants to break any records!

commonsparrow3 · Post by **commonsparrow3** » August 28th, 2021, 3:25 pm

The monthly LV Editors' Picks theme for January 2019 was "Epic Resolutions", i.e., really looong books. Ten long works, both solo and collaborative, are mentioned there.
Link - https://librivox.org/2019/01/01/epic-resolutions/
(My longest solo was a mere 37 hours, nothing compared to some of these marathons!)

Post by **TriciaG** » August 28th, 2021, 3:31 pm

I don't know if these are the longest, but they're in the top tier.

Solo: At 100:45:26, Mike Armenta read the entire King James Version Bible: https://librivox.org/bible-complete-king-james-version/

Group: Mrs. Beeton's? https://librivox.org/the-book-of-household-management-by-isabella-beeton/ 58:15:20

Dramatic: no idea, but one of the dramatic readings (regular novels read dramatically, as opposed to plays)

Shortest: we've got some that used to be standalone projects, but wouldn't be cataloged separately anymore, but would be in poetry/nonfiction/etc. collections. My nomination is The Gettysburg Address (1 minute, 40 seconds): https://librivox.org/the-gettysburg-address-by-abraham-lincoln/

EDIT: Great memory, Maria!

Post by **TriciaG** » August 28th, 2021, 3:36 pm

Oh, and I should also mention that it depends on your definition of "project". We do have a limit on the number of sections we can have in a project (255), so projects are often broken down into separately cataloged parts. It would be quite a challenge to figure out what would be the longest solo, if one took that into account. (For example, MaryAnn has bitten deeply into War & Peace, but I don't know what the run times add up to on her cataloged portions.)

EDIT: Err, only 2 volumes of W&P completed, for about 31 hours. But my point still stands.

commonsparrow3 · Post by **commonsparrow3** » August 28th, 2021, 3:41 pm

TriciaG wrote: ↑August 28th, 2021, 3:36 pmWe do have a limit on the number of sections we can have in a project (255), so projects are often broken down into separately cataloged parts.

Tricia, now you've reminded me of the first big collaborative project I joined when I was new at LV, William Still's Underground Railroad memoir, MC'd by MaryAnn. It was something over 40 hours total time, but broken down into 5 volumes of under 10 hours each, to make it more manageable.

Post by **Leni** » August 29th, 2021, 7:33 am

Pliny's Natural History is over 75 hours of cataloged work now, we are still on the last batch. I suspect it will finish close to 100 hours of recording. But again, depends if you consider it just one project.

BengtW · Post by **BengtW** » August 29th, 2021, 12:01 pm

I remember that the longest was the bible, https://librivox.org/bible-complete-king-james-version/. It broke the YouTube script that at the time could only handle works up to 100 hours and I had to increase it.