Most know that The Jazz Singer is considered the first commercial
movie called a “talkie”. This 1927 movie featured Al Jolson and was
actually part “talkie” and part silent film.

There were various sound experiments in the early 1920s, before the
release of The Jazz Singer, that included experiments by Lee DeForest
with a process known as Phonofilm. His process competed with the
other process known as Vitaphone. [Lee DeForest is considered the
inventor of the first electron amplifying tube.]

It turns out others experimented with sound synchronized to movies,
too.

It was known that Edison experimented with synchronizing his wax
cylinder machine with a movie clip in the mid 1890s. A film clip
existed, but not the sound source.

Recently, a wax cylinder was uncovered that was linked to Edison’s
experiment. The cylinder had been broken in several pieces. The
Edison National Historic Site people repaired the cylinder and had
the film clip (now housed by the Library of Congress) edited by
Hollywood’s Walter Murch. He used computer techniques to turn the
clip from the old 40 frames per second to a more modern 30 frames
per second. This gave the action in the film clip a more natural
feel. The movie included a man playing a violin and two others
dancing. A third man walked across the stage.

Finally, they laboriously synced the old repaired sound source to
the re-framed movie clip and made a new sound-linked copy. This 10
second performance can now be considered the oldest surviving
“talkie”. There is even someone back stage talking that can be
heard as they cue the performers. “The rest of you fellows ready?
Go ahead!”

The violinist is believed to be William K. L. Dickson, Edison’s
chief movie researcher.

It is quite remarkable that we now have a movie clip with sound that
is an artifact from the late 19th century. The entire reel lasts
about one minute with an introduction, three showings of the clip
and credits.

You can get old historic and early experimental films on Amazon.com.
(This is not an ad.)