"Crowley's Recordings of the Enochian Keys" -

The eighteen Enochian Keys or Calls, and the nineteenth that is known as the Call of the Thirty Aethyrs (or Airs), are poems as well as incantations. There is considerable music in the Keys. The imagery in the English versions, transmitted directly to Dee and Kelley by the Enochian angels, is striking and original. The Enochian versions, also transmitted directly from the angels themselves, have a gutteral power and rhythm. Even were the Keys not potent invocations, they would possess virtue for their artistry alone.

The Keys are intended to be voiced aloud, and to be heard recited aloud. Aleister Crowley recorded the first two Keys in both English and in the style of spoken Enochian that Crowley had learned during his Golden Dawn training. So far as I am aware, these are the only extant audio recordings of the Keys made by Crowley. If he made more, they do not appear to have survived.

The quality of the audio is quite poor due to the crude technology of the period in which the recordings were made. They were originally recorded onto wax cylinders, and at a later date transferred to 78 rpm disks. They are fascinating for what they reveal about Crowley's voice, and for the extremely theatrical way in which he recites the Keys. This is undoubtedly the style taught to him by Allan Bennett and MacGregor Mathers, two of his mentors in the Golden Dawn.

Crowley made a number of recordings in addition to the first two Keys, including an extract from his Gnostic Mass and a scattering of his short poems. There is even a song that is supposed to be in Crowley's voice, though I have my doubts about its authenticity. These audio recordings by Crowley have been collected together onto a CD that is available for sale in many esoteric book stores.

The edition of the CD that I possess was published by Transparency. The CD liner notes read: "These recordings were made on wax cylinders between 1910 and 1914 and then later preserved onto 78 rpm acetates." In the table of contents to the Transparency CD the first two Keys are referred to as "The Call of the First Aethyr" and "The Call of the Second Aethyr." This is incorrect. The thirty Aethyrs or Airs are based on the nineteenth Key, and are all identical except for the changing name of the Aethyr itself in the first sentence. In other words, all thirty Aethyrs are the Nineteenth Key, but with a different name for an Aethyr in each.

Those familiar with Enochian magic will know that the Aethyrs are concentric realms or dimensions of reality, each inhabited by its own hierarchy of spiritual beings. The first eighteen Keys are, in my opinion, designed to initiate or empower Enochian magic ritually by opening the four Gates of the Watchtowers, which are linked to the four corners of the earth. All the Watchtowers have sets of spirits with specific magical functions, and these spirits may be employed in a mundane way in the corresponding quarters of the world for occult purposes by Enochian magicians. The nineteenth Key is intended to call forth through those Gates the spirits of the thirty Airs or dimensions that surround the earthly plane like the layers of an onion. The spirits of the Airs rule, or more properly speaking are in occult resonance with, various geographical regions of the world. For example, the spirits of the First, or highest, Air, which is named LIL, rule over the land of Egypt, and everything to do with Egyptian history and culture.