Digitalizing old audio cassette tapes

For the first time in ages, I’m listening to an old, old Skara Brae audio cassette tape. Unfortunately it’s a poor copy of a copy—from my Irish class at UC Berkeley, 1998. I’m transcribing it to digital format (with an iPod speaker wire attached to my MacBook—a major technological breakthrough—thank you, Chris Breen)—thus saving all those old songs from obscurity. Caidé sin don té sin made it to YouTube, but many of the old songs in Irish didn't fare so well. In the process of salvaging obscure media, I’m also listening to Jane Bark’s tapes of her distant cousin Chrissie McDonald of Barra singing the old songs. A nugget to find Mari's Wedding in Scots Gaelic. A delight.

I experimented and took an iPod speaker splitter wire—to plug iPod into analogue stereo—and merely swapped the configuration. (Took me a VERY long while to arrive at a solution via Occam's Razor). I plugged it into the speaker output vs input—duh! I thus reversed the connection, and then plugged iPod headphone end into my MacBook line in. Half-way there. I then found a program that would record off the desktop. WireTap (old v.) will work, or open source Audacity, as does CD Spin Doctor—usually bundled with Toast. Mad audio scientist at work with no manual, as usual. We don’t need no stinkin’ instructions.

What I’ve learned is that, if you can get a sound register via the line-in, then, you can record anything, LPs too. Not great quality, but worth a try if the music is obscure enough to not make it to the digital age. I'm salvaging my old audio tapes first—obscure sean nós Irish singing tapes—most of which don't exist in digital format. Saving old audio cassettes from obscurity—bringing them into the digital age before they turn back to base iron—has been a bit of a journey with no map. But the relative obscurity and rarity of these songs makes it worthwhile to go the extra miles. 

Somewhat expanded and revised for clarification from two Facebook posts, added 6/21