Grammy
An AlmostLegendary Music Contraption
Here is paying tribute to thegramophone legend, without which we would have probably never had the advancementin the music scene of today.
It was 1877, when Thomas Edison invented histin-foil phonograph. The word "phonograph" was Edison's trade namefor his device, which played recorded sounds from round cylinders. The soundquality on the phonograph was bad and each recording lasted for one only play.Edison's phonograph was followed by Alexander Graham Bell's graphophone. Thegraphophone used wax cylinders which could be played many times, however, eachcylinder had to be recorded separately making the mass reproduction of the samemusic or sounds impossible with the graphophone.
On November 8 1887, Emile Berliner, aGerman immigrant working in Washington D.C., patented a successful system ofsound recording. Berliner was the first inventor to stop recording on cylindersand start recording on flat disks or records.
The first records were made of glass,later zinc, and eventually plastic. A spiral groove with sound information wasetched into the flat record. The record was rotated on the gramophone. The"arm" of the gramophone held a needle that read the grooves in therecord by vibration and transmitting the information to the gramophone speaker.
Berliner's disks (records) were thefirst sound recordings that could be mass-produced by creating masterrecordings from which molds were made. From each mold, hundreds of disks werepressed.
The groove on gramophone records usuallystarted near the periphery and ended near the center of the disc — the oppositeof the spiral of pits in the Compact Disc (CD) medium, which starts near thecentre and works outwards. Elridge Johnson patented a spring motor for theBerliner gramophone. The motor made the turntable revolve at an even speed andthere was no more hand cranking of the gramophone. The records were generally described by theirdiameter in inches i.e. 12-inch, 10-inch, 7-inch, etc., the rotational speed inrpm at which they were played "33 1/3 ", "78""45", etc., their time capacity ("Long Playing"), theirreproductive accuracy, or "fidelity", or the number of channels ofaudio provided ("Mono", "Stereo", "Quadraphonic",etc.).
It’sbeen quite some time since we have moved into the digital age of Blu-ray, mp3and AAC+ but a good run is many times owing to good start and that is exactlywhat the gramophone was.
An AlmostLegendary Music Contraption
Here is paying tribute to thegramophone legend, without which we would have probably never had the advancementin the music scene of today.
It was 1877, when Thomas Edison invented histin-foil phonograph. The word "phonograph" was Edison's trade namefor his device, which played recorded sounds from round cylinders. The soundquality on the phonograph was bad and each recording lasted for one only play.Edison's phonograph was followed by Alexander Graham Bell's graphophone. Thegraphophone used wax cylinders which could be played many times, however, eachcylinder had to be recorded separately making the mass reproduction of the samemusic or sounds impossible with the graphophone.
On November 8 1887, Emile Berliner, aGerman immigrant working in Washington D.C., patented a successful system ofsound recording. Berliner was the first inventor to stop recording on cylindersand start recording on flat disks or records.
The first records were made of glass,later zinc, and eventually plastic. A spiral groove with sound information wasetched into the flat record. The record was rotated on the gramophone. The"arm" of the gramophone held a needle that read the grooves in therecord by vibration and transmitting the information to the gramophone speaker.
Berliner's disks (records) were thefirst sound recordings that could be mass-produced by creating masterrecordings from which molds were made. From each mold, hundreds of disks werepressed.
The groove on gramophone records usuallystarted near the periphery and ended near the center of the disc — the oppositeof the spiral of pits in the Compact Disc (CD) medium, which starts near thecentre and works outwards. Elridge Johnson patented a spring motor for theBerliner gramophone. The motor made the turntable revolve at an even speed andthere was no more hand cranking of the gramophone. The records were generally described by theirdiameter in inches i.e. 12-inch, 10-inch, 7-inch, etc., the rotational speed inrpm at which they were played "33 1/3 ", "78""45", etc., their time capacity ("Long Playing"), theirreproductive accuracy, or "fidelity", or the number of channels ofaudio provided ("Mono", "Stereo", "Quadraphonic",etc.).
It’sbeen quite some time since we have moved into the digital age of Blu-ray, mp3and AAC+ but a good run is many times owing to good start and that is exactlywhat the gramophone was.
bibliography : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonograph