Fall 1994
The Urantia Foundation, in association with Brilliance Corporation, an industry leader in spoken-word, audio recordings, has produced a full-length, audio version of the English edition of The Urantia Book. Brilliance Corporation has recorded over 200 books on tape, and its president and founder, Michael Snodgrass, has been a reader of The Urantia Book for over 25 years.
The audio version of The Urantia Book will not only be an excellent study-aid for visually impaired and more auditorily-minded readers, but it will also enable the study of the book by listening at times, and during activities, when reading the book would be impossible. Those who have heard the recorded papers have been impressed with the technical quality and moved by the auditory experience of The Urantia Book. Hearing The Urantia Book provides a different access to, and a unique experience of, the fifth epochal revelation. Long-time readers will have a fresh approach, and non-English speakers will have a powerful English language aid.
Production Expertise. Producing a high-quality, audio version of The Urantia Book was no small task. The Foreword and 196 Papers comprise 1,126,913 words, 2,097 pages, many names, places, and terms which are hard to pronounce, and many concepts difficult to comprehend. Before beginning recording, Brilliance Corporation's staff, working closely with The Urantia Foundation staff, did exhaustive research on the pronunciation of all the words unique to The Urantia Book, as well as the many references to scientific terms, historic names, and geographic places.
The recordings, which took over a year to produce, were made in state-of-the-art recording studios which were specifically designed for volume production of voice recordings. Each recording session employed the services of a producer-director, a sound engineer, and a Foundation approved professional male or female voice talent, all meticulously following the text. This three-person team helped to assure that both the technical recording and the reading performance were of the highest quality.
Special Quality Control Measures. To help the professional readers communicate the complexities of The Urantia Book, the Foundation asked Stephen Zendt, a long-time reader of The Urantia Book with first-hand experience in professional voice recordings, to be our on-site representative and to oversee the recording sessions. In addition, Stephen personally recorded some of the book's Papers.
148 hours of The Urantia Book on 96 cassettes is almost fifteen times the length of the average recorded book. At the outset of the project, we had hoped to make The Urantia Book available on 48 cassettes by using a special compression-multitrack recording technique developed by Brilliance Corporation. But we decide not to use this technique because the quality of voice reproduction was not as good. The version we chose to produce will be of the highest quality and will consist of ninety-six tapes packaged in a heavy duty, vinyl carrying case.
Ordering. You may order the audio version of The Urantia Book by calling the Foundation at (312) 525-3319 or by sending a check or money order to The Urantia Foundation, 533 Diversey Parkway, Chicago, Illinois 60614. The price is US $285.00 plus shipping and handling.
We are pleased to announce The Urantia Book on audio tape, and as funding allows, we intend to produce audio versions of other languages.