CHAPTER 5 TIMELINE

Printed Page 130

CHAPTER 5 // TIMELINE
  • 1850s de Martinville
 The first experiments in sound recording are conducted using a hog’s-hair bristle as a needle; de Martinville can record sound but is unable to play it back.
  • 1877 Phonograph
 Edison invents the phonograph by figuring out how to play back sound.
  • 1888 or 1889 Flat Disk
 Berliner invents the flat disk and develops the gramophone to play it. The disks are easily mass-produced, and sound recording becomes a mass medium.
  • 1910 Victrolas
 Music players enter living rooms as elaborate pieces of furniture, replacing pianos as musical entertainment.
  • 1925 Radio Threatens the Sound Recording Industry
 “Free” music can be heard over the airwaves.
  • 1940s Audiotape
 Developed in Germany, the audiotape enables multitrack recording.
  • 1950s Music Industry
 As television threatens radio, radio turns to the music industry for salvation and becomes a marketing arm for the sound recording industry.
  • 1950s Rock and Roll
 This new music form challenges class, gender, race, geographic, and religious norms in the United States.
  • 1953 A Sound Recording Standard
 This is established at 331/3 rpm for long-playing albums (LPs), 45 rpm for two-sided singles.
  • 1960s Cassettes
 This new format makes music portable.
  • 1970s Hip-Hop
 This musical art form emerges.
  • 1983 CDs
 The first format to incorporate digital technology hits the market.
  • 2000 MP3
 A new format compressing music into digital files shakes up the industry as millions of Internet users share music files on Napster.
  • 2001 File-Sharing
 A host of new peer-to-peer Internet services make music file-sharing more popular than ever.
  • 2008 Online Music Stores
 Apple’s iTunes becomes the No. 1 retailer of music in the United States.