Music and the Unknown
Melvyn Willin on Paramusicology, King Tut + the Spirit of Caruso
In a secure garden building in eastern England, beside two life-sized triceratopses, I recently viewed audio, video, and artifacts from the most famous cases in the history of paranormal study.
The collection is part of the Society for Psychical Research (SPR), the first scientific organization to examine paranormal claims.1 The institution’s papers are housed in the archives at Cambridge University among Royal Charters, medieval manuscripts, and the complete works of Charles Darwin. Media ineligible for storage at Cambridge is cared for by the SPR’s Archive Officer Melvyn Willin — a retired professional musician and paramusicologist with two Ph.D.s, who jokingly suspects he may have been a dinosaur in a past life.