HISTORY

HISTORY
Emile Berliner (1851-1929 ) patented the gramophone.
Early attempts to design a consumer sound or music playing gadget began in 1877
when Thomas Edison invented his tin-foil phonograph. The word “phonograph”
was Edison’s trade name for his device, which played recorded sounds from round
cylinders. The sound quality on the phonograph was bad and each recording lasted
for one only play. Edison’s phonograph was followed by Alexander Graham Bell’s
graphophone. The graphophone used wax cylinders which could be played many
times, however, each cylinder had to be recorded separately making the mass
reproduction of the same music or sounds impossible with the graphophone.
1887 - Emile Berliner Invents The Gramophone And Records
On November 8 1887, Emile Berliner, a German immigrant working in Washington
D.C., patented a successful system of sound recording. Berliner was the first inventor
to stop recording on cylinders and 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 was etched into the flat record. The record was rotated on the
gramophone. The “arm” of the gramophone held a needle that read the grooves in the
record by vibration and transmitting the information to the gramophone speaker.(See
larger view of gramophone)
Berliner’s disks (records) were the first sound recordings that could be massproduced by creating master recordings from which molds were made. From each
mold, hundreds of disks were pressed. The Gramophone Company
Emile Berliner founded “The Gramophone Company” to mass manufacture his
sound disks (records) and the gramophone that played them. To help promote his
gramophone system Berliner did two things, he persuaded popular artists to record
their music using his system. Two famous artists who signed early on with Berliner’s
company were Enrico Caruso and Dame Nellie Melba. The second smart marketing
move Berliner made came in 1908, when he used Francis Barraud’s painting of ‘His
Master’s Voice’ as his company’s official trademark.
Emile Berliner sold the licensing rights to his patent for the gramophone and method
of making records to the Victor Talking Machine Company (RCA) who made the
gramophone a successful product in the United States. Berliner continued doing
business in other countries. He founded the Berliner Gram-o-phone Company in
Montreal, Canada, the Deutsche Grammophon in Germany, and the U.K based
Gramophone Co., Ltd. Company
The Victor Talking Machine Company, formed in 1901, commercialized the
gramophone based on Berliner’s patents, while in the U.K., the Gramophone
Company had been formed in 1897 to do much the same thing. Berliner, a native
German, also formed the Deutsche Grammofon company with his brother in 1898.
By 1906, Victor Talking Machine Company was already a major force in the music
industry when it introduced its first “Victrola,” a disc player with the horn inside the
cabinet instead of outside it. This and subsequent generations of Victrolas became
top-sellers, and “Victrola” became a generic term for the record player in the U.S.
The success of the disc was such that in 1912, Edison at last began offering disc-type
phonographs and records for sale in recognition of the large number of disks on
the market. Cylinder machines and records, however, were still produced until the
demise of Edison’s Entertainment Phonograph division in 1929.
The Western Electric Company (whose research activities were soon to be taken
over by the Bell Telephone Laboratories) developed an electronically amplified,
electromagnetic disc cutter of high quality in the early 1920s ,as well as a
conventional-looking but improved acoustic phonograph on which to play the
resulting records. The new device was marketed to phonograph and record
manufacturers (and also became the basis of talking films and “transcription”
recorders used in radio stations).
In October, 1924, Columbia Phonograph Company experimented with this new
“electrical” recording equipment developed by Western Electric. The new records
sounded different than those recorded by the acoustic process, and consumers
responded well to them. The trade-name “Orthophonic” was attached to both the
recording process and the record player.
Victor released its last phonograph discs made by the original acoustic process in
1925.
Displacement
The Western Electric Company (whose research activities were soon to be taken
over by the Bell Telephone Laboratories) developed an electronically amplified,
electromagnetic disc cutter of high quality in the early 1920s ,as well as a
conventional-looking but improved acoustic phonograph on which to play the
resulting records. The new device was marketed to phonograph and record
manufacturers (and also became the basis of talking films and “transcription”
recorders used in radio stations).
In October, 1924, Columbia Phonograph Company experimented with this new
“electrical” recording equipment developed by Western Electric. The new records
sounded different than those recorded by the acoustic process, and consumers
responded well to them. The trade-name “Orthophonic” was attached to both the
recording process and the record player.
Victor released its last phonograph discs made by the original acoustic process in
1925.
In the 1930’s wireless sets were provided with an input for Gramophones using
electric pick ups, Radiograms were becoming common place, these used electric
motors and the age of mechanical machines was coming to an end. If you had a
Gramophone and a Wireless (Radio) you could purchase an electric pick up and
replace the sound box turning your unit into an electric player with a wind up motor.
Electricity was the new fashion and eventually Gramophones would disappear for
those who could afford the new Radiograms, which were very big, floor standing, and
heavy, all well made and styled in wooden cabinets.The Gramophone both portable
and cabinet, and 78 rpm records were in use through the Second World War until
the 1950’s.
MUSIC
lead-in to “My Sin” recorded in 1929 by the California Ramblers on an Edison Diamond Disc.
listen to “My Sin” in it’s entirety
listen to an un-restored excerpt from the original recording
restored version with minimal filtering
1901 Der Freischütz (selections)
1901 Il Trovatore - El Miséréré
1910 Amoreuse
1910 Casse Noisette
1915 Light Cavalry Overture
1915 1812 Finale Overture
1917 Love’s Dream After the Ball
1920 Margie
1920 I’m a lonesome little raindrop (From the Greenwich Village Follies of
1920)
EBAY LINKS
Links to records for sale on ebay (including product description)
http://cgi.ebay.com/HEPZIBAH-MENUHIN-Gramophone-2057-8-2x78-SetMOZART-/120624930433?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item1c15ce5e81#ht_20
39wt_877
http://cgi.ebay.com/Dean-Reed-7-old-BalkanTon-gramophone-record/220678148238?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item336171508e#ht_500wt_1126
http://cgi.ebay.com/GABRIEL-BOUILLON-QUARTET-Gramophone-51093x78-DEBUSSY-/310249169534?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item483c4aa27e
#ht_2106wt_877
http://cgi.ebay.com/SPAIN-78-rpm-RECORD-Gramophone-GOYA-BalancePORTUGAL-/290484557812?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item43a23a97f4#ht
_1463wt_877
http://cgi.ebay.com/GRAMOPHONE-etc-3-discs-10-78RPM-NEVEUSWAAP-etc-/330480356246?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item4cf22a0b96#ht
_500wt_1126
http://cgi.ebay.com/BEATLES-Help-Im-Down-UK-GRAMOPHONE-LABEL/350376408186?pt=Music_on_Vinyl&hash=item51940fb47a#ht_1507wt_877
MODELS
Peter pan gramophone
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkeMGNFP9no&feature=related
1933 Odeon Gramophone in Action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=huGmdgEJl64&feature=related
Delemant wind-up gramophone playing Bing Crosby
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG-x5SQCRew&feature=related
LINKS
http://www.recordcollectorsguild.org/
http://www.gocontinental.com/pgde.htm
http://www.vinyl-record-collectors.net/record-collect.htm
http://mrgramophone.com/index.cgi?mode=book
http://collectorsshowandtell.abc.net.au/service/searchEverything.kickAction
?keywords=gramophone&as=37596