"Giovannoni is one of the most influential figures in early recorded medium preservation today, alongside unorthodox and eccentric collector Joe Bussard (1936–2022), who had a drastically different approach but equally made his priceless private collection accessible to fellow music lovers, researchers, and reissue labels." DISCOGS

David Giovannoni has been playing old records ever since he could climb a chair and peer into a Victrola. His lifelong interest in sound has led to a significant collection of early cylinder and disc records, which he makes available to historians, researchers, producers, and others with far-reaching applications. For instance, the Library of Congress is incorporating his Victor Pre-Matrix Recordings into its National Jukebox. His holdings of pioneer Victor Talking Machine (1900-1903) and American Berliner (1892-1900) recordings are the largest of their kind.

Giovannoni's collection of pioneer sound recordings is available at The Library of Historical Audio Recordings at i78s.

His ongoing historical reissue work and writing have been recognized with nine personal Grammy nominations and one Grammy.

As a private collector Giovannoni has curated two collections that have been inducted onto the National Recording Registry by the Librarian of Congress:

• The very first Yiddish recordings, made between 1901 and 1905 (inducted in 2019).
• Vernacular wax cylinders recordings made by phonograph owners at home for their own amusement, now held by UCSB's Special Collections (inducted in 2015).
• He also played a major role in identifying, cataloging, and playing back humanity's first recordings of its own voice. Made by Edouard-Léon Scott de Martinville in Paris between 1854 and 1861, these seminal recordings were inducted onto the National Recording Regstry in 2011 and inscribed on the Memory of the World Register by UNESCO in 2015.

He has contributed to several major discographies, including the Discography of American Historical Recordings, "Keen-O-Phone, Rex, and Imperial Records: The Complete Discography (1912–1918)", "The International Record Company Discography (1905–1907)", and the web-based version of Dick Spottswood's landmark "Ethnic Music on Record".

Compact Disc and Vinyl Productions

• Etching the Voice: Emile Berliner and the First Commercial Gramophone Discs, 1889-1895.  Archeophone Records; 2021.
  Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• Protobilly: The Minstrel & Tin Pan Alley DNA of Country Music, 1892-2017.  JSP Records, 2019.
  See Brenda Nelson-Strauss' review in Black Grooves.
• Edouard-Léon Scott de Martinville, Inventor of Sound Recording: A Bicentennial Tribute.  Archeophone Records, 2017.
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
  ARSC Awards for Excellence, Winner: Best History in Labels or General Recording Topics, 2018.
• Waxing the Gospel: Mass Evangelism and the Phonograph, 1890-1900.  Archeophone Records; 2016.
  Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• Edison Blue Amberol Records, Domestic Popular Series, Volumes 1-11.  Archeophone Records; 2013-2014.
• Au Clair de la Lune.  Parlortone Records, 2009.
• Debate '08: Taft and Bryan Campaign on the Edison Phonograph.  Archeophone Records; 2008.
  Press release.
  Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
  Featured in The Wall Street Journal — October 11, 2008.
• Actionable Offenses: Indecent Phonograph Recordings from the 1890s.  Archeophone Records; 2007.
  Press release.
  Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
  Featured in The New York Times, Arts & Leisure — July 8, 2007.
  Featured on NPR's Weekend Edition — June 16, 2007.
• Lost Sounds: Blacks and the Birth of the Recording Industry, 1891-1922.  Archeophone Records; 2005.
  
  Grammy Winner: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes

Giovannoni has contributed recordings, images, research, transfer and restoration services to numerous CD reissues, most recently:

• The Unique Quartette: Celebrated, 1895-1896.  Archeophone Records; 2020.
Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
• At the Minstrel Show: Minstrel Routines From the Studio, 1894-1926.  Archeophone Records; 2020.
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• The Missing Link: How Gus Haenschen Got Us From Joplin to Jazz and Shaped the Music Business.  Archeophone Records; 2020.
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1910 — Act Two, Scene New.  Archeophone Records; 2019.
• Arthur Fields: Singer, Songwriter, Soldier.  Archeophone Records; 2019.
• The Mike and Meyer Files: Joe Weber and Lew Fields.  Archeophone Records; 2019.
• Charles Asbury: 4 Banjo Songs, 1891-1897.  Archeophone Records; 2018.
• The Product of Our Souls: The Sound and Sway of James Reese Europe's Society Orchestra.  Archeophone Records; 2018.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1909 — Talk of Your Scand'lous Times.  Archeophone Records; 2017.
• Banjew.  Jalopy; 2017.
• Attractive Hebrews: The Lambert Yiddish Cylinders, 1901-1905.  Archeophone Records; 2016.
• Dan W. Quinn, Anthology: The King of Comic Singers, 1894-1917.  Archeophone Records; 2015.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1911 — Up, Up a Little Bit Higher.  Archeophone Records; 2014.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1919 — Jazzin' Around and Paintin' the Town.  Archeophone Records; 2014.
• Isham Jones, Happy: The 1920 Rainbo Orchestra Sides.  Archeophone Records; 2014.
Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• The Rise and Fall of Paramount Records 1928-1932, Volume 2.  Revenant Records; Third Man Records; 2014.
• The Rise and Fall of Paramount Records 1917-1932, Volume 1.  Revenant Records; Third Man Records; 2013.
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• Cal Stewart: The Indestructible Uncle Josh.  Archeophone Records; 2013.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1918 — Like the Sunshine After Rain.  Archeophone Records; 2013.
• Bohumir Kryl: World-Famous Wizard of the Cornet.  Archeophone Records; 2012.
• Eddie Morton: Ed. Morton's Bit of Broadway.  Archeophone Records; 2012.
• Van and Schenck: Pennant-Winning Battery of Songland.  Archeophone Records; 2012.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1914 — Her Memory Haunts You.  Archeophone Records; 2011.
• Clarice Vance & May Irwin: The High Priestess of Jollity & The Southern Singer.  Archeophone Records; 2011.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1920 — Even Water's Getting Weaker.  Archeophone Records; 2011.
• There Breathes a Hope: The Legacy of John Work II and his Fisk Jubilee Quartet, 1909-1916.  Archeophone Records; 2010.
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• Sophie Tucker: Origins of the Red Hot Mama, 1910-1922.  Archeophone Records; 2009.
Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1906 — When Things Was Lookin' Bright.  Archeophone Records; 2009.
• Ain't Gonna Settle Down: The Pioneering Blues of Mary Stafford and Edith Wilson.  Archeophone Records; 2008.
• Before Radio.  Archeophone Records; 2008.
• Nat M. Wills: The Famous Tramp Comedian.  Archeophone Records; 2007.
• The Great War: An American Musical Fantasy.  Archeophone Records; 2007.
• You Ain't Talkin' To Me: Charlie Poole and the Roots of Country Music.  Columbia Legacy (Sony); 2005.
  
  Grammy Nominated: Best Historical Album
  Grammy Nominated: Best Album Notes
  Grammy Nominated: Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package
• Henry Burr, Anthology: The Original King of Pop.  Archeophone Records; 2005, new edition 2012.
• Wilbur Sweatman's Original Jazz Band, Jazzin' Straight Thru' Paradise.  Archeophone Records; 2005, new edition 2011.
• The Phonographic Yearbook: 1916 — The Country Found Them Ready.  Archeophone Records; 2004, new edition 2013.
• Bert Williams: The Early Years, 1901-1909.  Archeophone Records; 2004.
  The Williams and Walker cakewalk postcards co-released with this CD are from the originals in the Giovannoni collection.
• Eddie Morton: The Sound of Vaudeville, Volume 1.  Archeophone Records; 2003.
• Stomp and Swerve: American Music Gets Hot.  Archeophone Records; 2003, new edition 2011.

His audio restoration work can be heard on:

• Etching the Voice: Emile Berliner and the First Commercial Gramophone Discs, 1889-1895.  Archeophone Records; 2021.
• The St. Louis Tinfoil. Recorded in June 1878, this remarkable recording is the earliest and best surviving example of a public exhibition of Thomas Edison's newly-invented phonograph. The recording was inducted onto the National Recording Registry in 2021. Listen to the St. Louis Tinfoil.
• Edouard-Léon Scott de Martinville, Inventor of Sound Recording: A Bicentennial Tribute.  Archeophone Records, 2017.
• Banjew.  Jalopy; 2017.
• Goodnight Ladies and Gents: The Creole Music of Lionel Belasco.  Rounder Records; 1999.
  See Linton Corbie's review in the Folk & Acoustic Music Exchange.
  See Stacy Phillips's review in Roots World.
• Peter Was A Fisherman: The 1939 Trinidad Field Recordings of Melville and Frances Herskovits, Volume 1. Rounder Records; 1998.
• Calypso Calaloo: Early Carnival Music in Trinidad.  Rounder Records; 1993.
  Together with the book of the same name, winner of the 1994 Chicago Folklore Prize.

Other Audio Activities

Giovannoni's archives and expertise are available to select researchers and producers. Notable productions on which he's been consulted include:

• How We Got To Now  (PBS & BBC, 2014),
• Who Killed Lindbergh's Baby?  NOVA (PBS 2013),
• 101 Gadgets That Changed the World  (The History Channel, 2011),
• Leonard Bernstein: An American Life  (WFMT, 2004),
• A World in Your Ear  (BBC Radio 4, 2001),
• Marcus Garvey: Look For Me in the Whirlwind  The American Experience (PBS, 2001),
• America 1900  The American Experience (PBS, 1999),
• I'll Make Me a World: A Century of African-American Arts  (PBS, 1999),
• and NPR’s Lost and Found Sound: A Radio Anthology for the Millennium  (NPR, 1999-2001).

Requests for specific recordings or information will be considered.

• Giovannoni is a founder of the First Sounds initiative.
• He served on the board of The Association for Recorded Sound Collections from 2008 through 2014.
• He is the 2019 recipient of the Distinguished Service to ARSC Award.
• He is a voting member of The Recording Academy.
• The preservation work of the Smolian-Giovannoni Foundation continues at the Library of Congress.