Amazingly enough, there is very little material that I have lost through an accident in the recording process. Out of over 200 cassettes, only 3 or 4 times when I accidentally recorded over something, forgot to turn on the microphone, etc. The minidiscs were always harder for me — I somehow never "understood" those recordings. Dick would copy the recordings to the computer, but I didn't take care to monitor the names he gave the files, or really verify what we had (and we'd gotten sloppy about identifying things, too).
In this case, I knew that we had recorded at least two discs in the village of Drúževo, north of Sofia, near Milánovo. But I could only ever find one file. Yesterday I was looking through yet another hard drive with backup Bulgarian material on it, and I noticed a folder named "Saved minidiscs" — I remembered the name. One was about Drúževo but had a mysterious phrase "Martha announce" in the file name. That sounded odd. The two files were very nearly the same length, but I opened both so I could compare them. Took me a little while to feel 100% sure, but it turned out to be the long-missing file! I am so excited to have it back! The woman I had recorded on that day and the next had given me some traditional songs, and some that she herself had composed. Finally I can see what I really heard there!
I was going to make a start on a new song post, but it got too late (2am), so I have to put that off for a day or two in order to do it justice. It's a promise!
I love it when I think something is lost, then finally find it! Good Job!