Part 20.  The Attack of the Automatons : Robot Ancestors.

The History of Automatons. Chapter 1.

Ben and Dave both suffered from pins and needles

Today we start a brand new thread in our history series. The Automatons.

We’re going to discover all about the modern robot’s strange ancestors. We’re taking a strange trip into the weird and wonderful fascination mankind has to imitate living things.

But first an explanation.

If you’ve been following the blog for a while now you probably realize that some of our tales tend to go on small tangential trips before returning to the story at hand.  All the best stories do, especially those that are true.

Throughout our story so far we’ve alluded to these fascinating machines a few times, in fact, they’ve been responsible for some of those minor tangents mentioned above.

As we promised in previous posts, the tale of man’s obsession for making the mechanical act biological, deserves it’s very own tale, one that will unfold over the next few months.
And as you’ll soon discover, their relevance to the history of electronic music is more than most people realize.

So What’s an Automaton?

Glad you asked..

An Automaton is “a machine which by means of mechanical, pneumatic, hydraulic, electric or electronic devices is able to imitate a living body”.

In other words making the artificial seem biological.

Automatons are to Robots, as Caveman is to Modern Man.
As mankind becomes more sophisticated so does the robot.
In many ways the history of the automaton closely reflects the history of engineering.

The First Automaton’s.

The Word Automaton is derived from the Greek automatos: ‘meaning acting of one’s own will or spontaneously’ and it is the Greek’s that are the most famous for the beginnings of the automaton, but it should be noted that the Chinese seemed to have been just as obsessed with auotomatons and for almost as long.

Obsession seems to be the root word

Automatons even appear in Greek myth, Daedalus used quicksilver to install a voice in his statues. Hephaestus created automata for his workshop: Talos, an artificial man of bronze, and, according to Hesiod, the woman Pandora.

In fact it was the Greek philosopher Aristotle who conceptualized the idea of what would one day be called robots: “If every tool, when ordered, or even of its own accord, could do the work that befits it . . . then there would be no need either of apprentices for the master workers or of slaves for the lords.”

The Greeks used automata as toys, religious idols and tools for demonstrating scientific principals.

The earliest recorded mention of automata comes as far back, as the Greek Poet Pindar (ca. 522–443  BC). In his seventh Olympic Ode, writing about the island of Rhodes, he said:

The animated figures stand,

Adorning every public street,
And seem to breathe in stone,
or move their marble feet.

The earliest specific records of a these mechanical marvels goes back to  somewhere between 400 -350 B.C

Archytas of Tarentum a good friend of Plato is reputed to have designed and built the first artificial, self-propelled flying device.
Called The Pigeon, It was a bird-shaped model that was propelled by a jet of what was probably steam. It was reported being able to fly up to 200 meters!
(Although it must be said that The Pigeon, may have been suspended on a wire or pivot for its flight..)

The next historical records comes from another Greek, and an old friend of this blog’s Hero of Alexandria. (c.10-70 AD).
In parts 4 and 5 we talked about how hero would create all sorts of automata from singing birds to trumpet playing heralds.

Hero even created stages that would move on to stage of it’s own accord, show an animated musical play that would even include his automata pour wine, create fire then drink, and move back off stage again.

To catch up on Hero click here.

Hero of Alexandria

We also know that automata were widespread in China by the time of the Sui Dynasty (6th century AD), when the ‘Shai Shih t’u Ching Book of Hydraulic Excellencies’, was written, some believe that many of the devices in this wonderful tome may even go back as far as 200 B.C.

These incredible artisans built sophisticated mechanical animals, including birds with moving parts and otters that swallowed fish.

There were also flying automatons, mechanized doves and fish, angels and dragons, and automated cup-bearers, all hydraulically-actuated for the amusement of Emperors by anonymous engineer-craftspeople.

I like how they felt they also had to take the wig off to show the inside workings..

But to me their masterpiece was surely an entire mechanical orchestra.
Unfortunately I can find very little written about this, which strikes me as odd as surely something as profound as the first musical mechanical polyphonic instrument would be important?
Previous to this post in chapter 14 I reported that the Panharmonicon was the first truly polyphonic orchestral instrument. If the this mechanical orchestra is true it predated the Panharmonican by over 1800 years!

See.. another tangent!

And it is on this tangent – one that connects the story back to music, where we can see that even from the beginning of man’s obsession with the automaton, we have searched for ways to get them to make sound and music. In fact by the end of this tale of the mechanical imitating the biological, we will discover the very first digitized speech! (and you won’t believe how long ago it was created too!)

In our next part we’re going to visiting the world’s first programmable robot, Leonardo Divinci’s little known masterpiece and the device that started an automatom fad across Europe that would last 200 hundred years and end with real life robots!

Coming soon – part 2 in the Attack of the Automatons!

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The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 6

Welcome back!

The Hippies! They rejected material possessions, but apparently not marketing slogans!

Some say that the record players industry peaked in the 60’s..  What can definitely be said is that from the end of WWII the record player was really the only contender.

By the 70’s Hi-fidelity record players had the ability to reproduce sound almost completely free of defects.

Even a $200 vinyl record player had very little flutter and low rumble.

There were many improvements that did their part to improving the listening experience, belt and direct-drives, jewel-balanced tone arms, electronically controlled linear tracking and magnetic cartridges.

There was even quadraphonic sound.

That’s right, this may be a surprise to you reading this, but we had surround sound in the 70’s.
In fact for the 30^th anniversary of Dark Side of the Moon, Pink Floyd released a re-master of their original quadraphonic mix of the classic album it’s available on SACD.

The most sold record in history: " you've got to keep the loonies off the grass"

The 4 channel sound was created by electronic matrixing (putting out of phase), and then through the use of special record player head and phase detection circuits (sounds like something out of star trek doesn’t it) the amplifier was then able to decode the signal into 4 separate channels.

Even though this was a major breakthrough from both a technological and audiophile perspective, it didn’t really grab the imagination or the wallet of the average consumer and quadraphonic sound was short lived.

Until of course, the development of surround sound home theater systems and SACD players. Although this technology was made popular not through surround music but people wanting to replicate the experience of the 3D sound experienced when going to the cinema.

In this clip from  Not the nine o’clock news (with a very young Rowan Atkinson, Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones) Poke fun at the changing face of the gramophone!!

Records themselves became an art form in the 70’s onward . The large surface meant that the designs of the albums and the discs themselves became part of the attraction of collecting vinyl.  Something that many Vinyl collectors still value today.

All of these improvements kept the record on top as the music industry’s champ, even though from the late 60’s on, there was a new kid on the block  – the eight-track player.
The eight-track was popular because of it’s portability, it’s ability to record onto and was able to do one thing especially well that the record player did dismally – it could play music in the car.
Yet despite losing a little market share the record industry was still the king.

Cliff Richard loved his walkman, but his friends loved spandex more!

Then in the 80’s a new invention hit the footpaths attached to the heads of joggers everywhere, the Sony walkman, inventions like this and the rising popularity of portable cassette recorders meant that the compact cassette which had been around in one form or another since the mid sixties suddenly became very popular.

The cassette, like the eight track was even more portable, and like the eight track could be recorded onto, cassette decks started to appear everywhere and really starting giving the humble record a run for it’s money.

Yet the record player was still seen as the better quality device, in fact it was popular practice to buy the record, use it for playing on the stereo at home, and create a dub or copy onto a blank cassette for the car, the walkman or the radio cassette recorder (boombox/ghetto blaster).

The final challenger to the record arrived in ’82, the Compact Disc.

Initially only making a splash with digital audiophiles and the wealthy’s lounge rooms, it was too expensive, but still garnered a lot of press.
CD’s were more portable than cassettes and Eight-tracks, and was marketed as having a higher sound quality than record players, , they meant that they started to replace the record at home as well.
As CD player prices came down their popularity increased and CD’s quickly began to take over the record’s market.

By 1988, for the first time since it’s rise to prominence.  After being number 1 for nearly a century, the Gramophone sold less units than it’s competition – The Compact Disc had become King.

CD’s and Cassettes were the dominant consumer listening formats.
The demise of Vinyl’s popularity, was swift, dropping suddenly between ’88 and ’91.

Seen by some as a calculated ploy to make consumers switch to he more profitable format -CD’s, distributors began charging retailers more for new product if they returned unsold Vinyl, then started to refuse to give credit for any returns at all.
This caused retailers to only (conservatively) order titles that they believed would sell, thus giving more shelf space (a premium) to CD’s and Cassettes.
Then finally record companies deleted many vinyl titles for production and distribution.

It was all over for the record player.

Or was it?

The effect that the phonograph and gramophone has had on music is immense, simply enormous. For the first time in history, music could be captured in time, a performance could be immortalized and replayed at will. Sound could be preserved.

The durations available on records have shaped the length of pop songs, it’s supported and help sustain the radio industry, it’s helped create the values of generations, and was one of the loudest voices of the counter-culture revolution of the sixties. It’s given an untold amount of people pleasure, and many an opportunity for rock stars to drive their cars into a pool.

The wheels of steel, the ones and two's, Note the pop up light to see the record grooves in dark night clubs (amongst other things)

But their story has not ended.

Let’s go back to the 70’s for a moment..

My personal favorite 70’s improvement and one that doesn’t get a lot of press, happened in 1979. Technics added a pitch (speed) control to it’s SL-1200 model record player, making it the MKII. This was done from advice based on  a very real need from DJ’s. This simple improvement gave much more control to their beat mixing.

The Technics 1200 MKII turntable is still very much in production, is one of the most popular turntables ever sold and is known as the DJ and turntablists best friend.

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In 2001 The National Association of Music Merchandisers (NAMM) officially recognized the turntable as an instrument.

And Here’s Why… DJ FLY DMC World Champion 2008 on the wheels of steel.

(warning this clip contains explicit lyrics and some implicit licks!)

That year it outsold guitars at a 2-1 ratio.

The digital revolution of mp3’s and the like has had an impact, on the DJ industry, but the record is still the format of choice for most.

This isn’t just because of the sound, Records are tactile, the DJ can pick up the needle and place it where ever they please in micro seconds, for speed and pitch control the DJ can slightly slow the record down or speed it up with the pressure and movement of his hand and wrist. The control cannot be matched.

Many house and techno artists only release on Vinyl.

New technologies such as CD platters have helped but are still not as good.

Now technologies such as final scratch have helped bridge the gap between the digital formats (mp3’s) and vinyl. Final scratch and other  similar applications very cleverly use a timecoded vinyl control record. This contains an incremental digital signal that is sent back to the digital  player and mapped over the chosen digital track, thus giving the DJ tactile control over the digital format.

But it’s not just DJ’s that are still buying Vinyl. It’s also very popular in genres such as alt-metal, hardcore punk and indie-rock.

Audiophiles and collectors are increasingly being joined by young people as they discover that in a digital world the tactile feel, the artwork, and the sound is a beauty that cannot be replaced by a mp3 and a jpeg.

In the United states Vinyl sales have been increasing steadily. Sales between 06-07 increased by 85.5% and increased again by 89% the following year. In 2009 record sales were up again this time by 35%. Meaning 2.9 million units shipped. This does not include boutique records or 2^nd hand sales.

It should be stated that this only accounts for less than 1% of total unit sales in the U.S.
But what it does tell us is that the resurgence of Vinyl doesn’t look to be just a fad.

Meanwhile sales of CD’s are plunging, mainly being replaced by digital downloads.
Sales for CD’s dropped 20% in America in 2009.

Will the record player stand up against the test of time?

The old meets the new... The record player still lives "brewha ha ha ha!" -evil laugh-.

Who knows what’s around the corner…

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CLICK HERE for the previous chapter

CLICK HERE for the INDEX of History Of Electronic Music

Welcome back!

It's really easy to work.. that bit goes there and through that other thing, then you move that other piece while moving that thingy..simple huh!?

In the last part of our journey we discovered how the town clock was turned into the watch, and the carillon was turned into the music box.

Today we continue the story of mechanical music, and this time we’re going to look at how a loom was turned into a computer!

Our story starts in a French textile in Lyon.

Basile Bouchon was a textile worker, and the son of an organ maker.

One of the most tedious and time-consuming parts of the weaving process was setting up the draw loom. Basile most probably was influenced by his father’s mechanical skills, particularly the use of a barrel to program songs. In 1725 Basile had the brilliant idea to use perforated paper tape(holes punched out of them) to control weather or not the chords on the warp of the loom would trigger. This was great lateral thinking as the wooden or metal barrels used in organs were not practical for the weaving process,

This served to partially automate the task, but still required a draw boy to control the operation.

In 1728 Jean Fouchon expanded the number of chords that could be automated and eliminated some mistakes in the lifting of threads by  re-arranging the holes into rows and changing from a paper loop to rectangular paper that could be joined together even to create an endless loop if necessary.

In 1741 the process was improved slightly by Jacques de Vaucanson,

An inventor whom actually deserves his own installment ( soon)

The problem was not solved until 1801 by Joseph Marie Jarcquard (actually formally Joseph Marie Charles).

He was the son of a silk merchant and was boy around 1750, a time when cloth weaving was a big industry especially in Lyon. Jarcuard was made to work at his fathers loom as a drawboy. His job was to sit inside the loom and lift or move the threads depending on his fathers direction, this job meant long time consuming and very tedious hours.

As a boy he did not receive any education and was illiterate until the age of 13, when his brother in law, a printer and book seller both taught him and introduced him to scholars and learned societies.

After dabbling in various unprofitable ventures Jacquard started to toy with loom and weaving inventions, but his revolutionary invention was put on hold, because of the disruption caused by the other one, err, that is the French revolution.

In 1803 his invention was complete, he had created an fully automated system that contary to popular belief was not a new loom but a “head’ that could be attached to pre-existing looms of the time.

He system was one of punch cards and hooks. These think paper cards had holes punched into rows, each row corresponded to a row in the design. The needles and hooks used for the weaving were guided by the holes in the cardboard. When the hooks hit a hole it would pass through the card and with the needle insert a thread.

The Jacquard card punching system replaced the boring job of weaving with the dull job of punching holes in cardboard..or should that be card bored?!

The simplest of repeating designs would fit onto a single card, the more complex the design the more cards needed. Heavily brocaded materials were often created by shuffling through a whole deck of cards.

Before his invention the amount of time it took to create a complex pattern eliminated most of the profit made on the sale.

Now ordinary workmen could produce beautiful patterns that normally took great skill patience and a lot of work. It sped up manufacturing dramatically and got rid of the need for the draw boy.

His invention was at first fiercely opposed by many silk weavers fearing that his invention would mean they would be out of jobs, in fact Jaquard was almost killed by an angry mob and many of his looms were destroyed. (remember this is not long after the revolution)

However Nepoleon thought his invention was marvelous, declared the Jaquard loom (or head) public property, gave Jacquard a pension and a royalty on each machine created.

He must have died a rich man, because by 1812, it is reported that an estimated 11,000 looms were working in France.

Punch cards were a revolutionary way to store information, and to retrieve information in the form of a sequence of operations.

Eccentric English mathematician Charles Babbage, would later use this idea as part of his designs for his analytical engine (1837-71)  now known as the direct precursor to the modern computer.

In 1890 a statistician named Herman Hollerith used punch cards to organize and sort his data from the 1890 U.S Census. His company would eventually become IBM, whom famously used punch cards in much of it’s programming and data storage work in early computers.

But it is for the revolution that was created in the music industry that is the main reason we include him today.

To find out just how this changed how we listened to music click here for part 16.

But before you do have a close look at this image!

It’s  portrait of Joseph-Marie Jacquard our hero from the above story..

What makes it truly incredible is that is actually a woven piece of silk 85 x 66cm and was created by the weaver Michel-Marie Carquillat, at Lyon, France in 1839.
The image also incudes Michel-Marie’s name and caption.

As the historyofscience.com reports

Wow!!!!

Ready for the next chapter?  CLICK HERE FOR PART 16

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Part 14.  How to Fit an Orchestra in a Cabinet..

Today we continue the story of how mechanical music became part of everyday life.

Gee mum that's a heck of a cookoo clock!

In 1354 an astronomical clock was completed at the cathedral in Strasbourg France. The “Three Kings Clock” had installed several automata, which included a bird made of copper iron and wood, that flapped it’s wings, put out it’s feathers, opened it’s beak stuck out it’s tongue and crowed (using a reed and bellows). The clock also had another display featuring the three kings bowing before the baby Jesus at noon. This was accompanied by a tune played with a set of miniature carillon.

In 1500 The Arch Bishop of Salzburg in Austria ordered a mechanical organ to be built, it had no keyboard to be played manually, initially like the bell it was originally designed as a communication device, sounding the start and the end of the day throughout the city.

Almost 150 years later a barrel mechanism similar to that of those of carillon’s was installed and for the next 150 years it could only play the one song ( and you thought you get sick of hearing pop songs on the radio!)
In 1753 Leopold Mozart the Father of the more famous Wolfgang composed a further 11 pieces for it. Today unfortunately only 9 survive.  These type of instruments became known as “barrel organs”

These inventions may seem like a novelty today, but created and installed in places of such cultural significance, these were seen as the very latest wonders of mechanical technology,

It was not long until rich landowners, were having much smaller barrel organs built to be installed at home, to entertain themselves and their guests. The amazing thing.. they also had automata and were controlled much the same way as Ktselbiios and Hero had first designed them, yep you guessed it they were the Hydraulis!

By the late 1500’s this technology was used to create “flute clocks”, the clock and pipes were powered not by water but by a weight hung from a string.

Once again the pins on the barrel opened valves on the organ pipes.

To say that these became popular was an understatement, these were the iPhone of the day, in fact Germany’s Black Forest became the capital for organ building, between 1359 and 1780 there were more than 200 successful busy organ building companies.

It was in the 1700’s that automatic organs with keyboards, became popular in church’s across Europe. This was mainly due to the greater complexity in the pieces composed and general lack of talented organ players up to the task.

This technology also evolved to crank operated organs made famous by the image of the organ grinder and his monkey.

The real ones were covered in wood on the outside... this saved many a cat's life.

In the mid to late 1800’s the equivalent of the 68 inch plasma screen for the rich and famous, was the “Orchestron”.

They were designed to simulate an orchestra, somehow by just using organ pipes and percussion instruments! Once again the music was played by detachable barrels with raised pins.

It’s first version appeared at the start of 1800, was called “ThePanharmonicon”, was invented by Johann Nepomuk Maelzel and was made even more famous because Beethoven composed his celebration of the defeat of Napoleon “Wellingtons Sieg” on it.

This thing was huge! (see photo)

Because of the percussion involved, this was the first truly polyphonic orchestral instrument.

Just like comparing the first computers to the modern day devices such as pda’s, just think about what we can use today to play full hi-fidelity sound, compare this behemoth to the Apple Shuffle!

By about 1850, smaller more compact versions become available for the wealthy to have installed in their homes… I say smaller, but they would often take up an entire wall..

These for all intents and purposes were the first juke boxes, the first hifi’s, these we’re the start of music players with selectable music made for home entertainment. They were created for those that were not quite rich enough to afford musicians on staff.

America with it’s large amount of millionaires became a huge market for the manufactures of Orchestrons.

Toward the end of the 19^th century simultaneously in America and Europe , the technology spawned yet another version of the Orchestron. This time they were not made smaller for indoors, but were made for outdoors were often larger and always louder!
The automated organ had evolved into Europe’s Fair Ground Organs and America’s Band Organs.

These brash instruments were designed to be installed at circuses, carnivals, merry go rounds and ice skating rinks, and they were made to be loud! Their music was used to draw crowds, and be heard above them, the carnival rides and the noise of the carousel. These also had percussion effects, usually a bass drum, a cymbal and a snare, and often had ranks and ranks of pipes.

So the time was ripe, the marketing was everywhere these mechanical machines were a wondrous part of musical society.

Now the question asked was what can we do to make this available for many not just the few..
..and one of the answers arrived on paper that was in no language that had ever existed..

Tune into part 15 to find out what!

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The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 5

Welcome Back!

Rudolph Valentino - wow man like whatta Rebel..

Ok, so in the last chapter, we covered the technological revolution that put the record player firmly into the no1 position as the tool for audio playback.

But at the same time another revolution was happening across the western world, especially in America.

In February 1949, RCA Victor released the very first 45rpm single, only 7 inches in diameter it had a large hole in it’s center so that it could be fitted to devices that had an automatic playing mechanism, allowing singles to be dropped down in a stack on top of each other per play.
These singles had a playing time of 4 minutes each side and were made from Vinyl or polystyrene.

Singles were mass-produced and cheap to buy, they were so wide spread that they could often be found on the counter of the local drugstore.

To coincide with this new hobby of collecting singles the Top 40 was started by Todd Storz from the KOWH radio station.

But the single was not so much the revolution but part of it’s fuel.
The revolutionaries appeared on the scene sprouting strange words and listening to far out beats. The Teenager had arrived.

From the country that brought you pancake stacks comes the 45 stacks.. not as nutricious, but certainly tasty..

Before the 1950’s there was almost no transitionary time between childhood and adulthood.  Children were taught to think as their parents, have the same thoughts as their parents and generally act like mini me’s. You either went to school a child and left school as an adult or you enlisted as a child and came back a man.

But starting in the 50’s young people 16-18 started ‘hanging out’ doing their own thing and listening to their own music, they devoured pop music and made it their own, they had enough pocket money to afford 45’s and portable radios, and with the smaller record size came smaller more portable 45 only players. The teenagers didn’t have phonographs, only squares called them that, they played their singles on ‘record players’.  The music scene gave them their own language, and with all that came their ‘own ideas’.

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What started as the 50’s rebel who was like this..

With the advent of the 60’s and Rock’n’roll, this developed even further, the ‘devils music’ made teenagers question authority and believe in the ideals of their own generation. The ‘50’s teenager was old enough to really start to make waves, not the least being in a band and making their own music.

Granted there were also other socio/political factors involved, but for this discourse lets mainly focus on the music side of things.

Ended up like this!  (go Jimi!!)

The fab four, take note of Ringo in his Cross-dressing phase - eat your heart out Bowie.

This was an incredible boom for the record industry, for the music industry, and for radio and television stations.  This is what gave the teenager power. As much as their parents may have been against this new behavior, it was the money that they gave their kids that helped fuel it.

The teenager still drives the music market today. Channel V and MTV’s core demographic is between 12 – 15 years of age.

Also almost a small side note, in 1963 with nothing more than a small tiny splash, Phillips introduced the first compact cassette tape. But it wouldn’t be until this little wonder was a teenager itself before anyone in the music industry would start to take notice.

Some people say that during the 70’s, as people were recovering from the shock of the 60’s, they took the best of the decade before and improved on them. Rock’nRoll, free love and giving young people a voice against corruption and war to name a few.

If you believe this to be true or not,  it’s true as far as the rsord player is concerned.

CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT WHY IN PART 28

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The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 4

Everyone in the band is wearing a life jacket, i'm not sure if it's a lack of confidence in the boat they're on, or their ability as musicians..

Well even though the news promises to get better soon, we also start on a low note. World War Two.

Most records at the time were made from a rather brittle formula of Shellac, powdered slate, a cotton compound similar to manilla paper and wax lubricant.

Vinyl was first used in 1939 for a cigarette commercial that was mailed to radio stations, the reason they used vinyl was that it’s flexibility meant it was much less likely to break in the mail.

This new surface while more prone to scratches and static and dust build up, had a much lower surface noise level.
But initially it was simply it’s durability for mailing that increased it’s popularity, companies that sent both music and commercials to radio stations began to send vinyl through the mail.

During WWII, The armed forces created thousands of records called V discs for the soldiers to play, they were all pressed on Vinyl, both because of it’s durability and that shellac was in short supply due to Japans invasion of South east Asia.

Incidentally, it’s those brave souls, who, armed to the teeth with V-discs would play records for the soldiers during R’n’R that were known as the first DJ’s!

Here’s a clip of the wonderful Vera Lyn singing we’ll meet again in 1941, it’s accompanied by images from world war 2 (no jokes here for this one)

After WWII, the turntable’s only real major competition was the radio, but as each device had a distinct advantage over each over, they were able to each carve it’s own niche. Radio provides information, entertainment and music that you don’t own, infinitely for the one entry price, so it’s value is immense, but the freedom of choice is limited to the programming available from the various stations. Record players on the other hand give you the control of playing whatever you have access to, whenever you want, how you want. The turntable provides a better sound, allows the freedom of choice, the freedom of self expression, and also fuels the rather powerful addiction of collecting.

Also lets not forget that even the radio depended on record for a large portion of their broadcasting content.

All of these strengths were capitalised on after WWII.

In 1931 RCA Victor was the first company to attempt to release long player records, but failed due to the hardships of the great depression.

For those of you born after 1995 this is what an Vinyl LP looks like!

Columbia Records spent 9 years on research and development for their version of the 12inch (30cm) LP (long player) and released the 33½ rpm microgroove record in 1948. These were made of vinyl and as such had a low surface noise.

Soon new methods of recording and mastering were adopted onto vinyl records such as equalization curves and the use of reel to reel magnetic tape recording technology that was found in Germany after the war.
Sound quality had made a quantum leap.

The 50’s saw the first breed of “Audiophiles’ – people who were concerned with getting the very best hearing quality out of the much improved sound embedded in their new LP’s.  These Audio purists came about as result of the development of High Fidelity – or hi-fi sound.
This was achieved through buying separate complex highly engineered components, such as turntables, loudspeakers, pre-amplifiers, and power amplifiers, all with the cumulative effect of a greater frequency response and much higher power output capability, allowing the playing of much greater audio peaks without distortion.

Then in 1958 sound experienced another quantum improvement.

I'm not sure if this diagram makes things clearer or will just complicate the issue..

To get a little geeky for second, it was thanks to the development of the Westrex single-groove 45/45 stereophonic record cutting lathe.
In basic terms the stylus (record needle) achieved stereo playback by by reading differences in signal vertically (up and down) as well as the mono-recording’s standard horizontal movement. (side to side).

For a far more technical description CLICK HERE

Gradually, People referred to playing records on their ‘stereo’ as well as  ‘hi-fi’ thus the terms were coined and began to replace the use of ‘phonograph’ and ‘gramophone’

It should be said that, according to Audiophiles hi-fi has another meaning:

The 50’s and early 60’s is often referred to as “The Golden Age of Hi-Fi” as this was a time when many audio components  were created using tube equipment, many now famous for their warmth and clarity. Lots of purists believe that quality fell dramatically with the subsequent introduction of solid-state systems.

In the next chapter we’re going to look at the other revolution that changed the face of music forever. It’s revolutionaries dressed funny, were not very tall, and had their own strange language.. To find out just who they were in CLICK HERE.

I might be showing my age here, but that is a seriously cool looking bit of kit - Cool name too.. "the Quad II Power Amplifier"

For part 27 CLICK HERE.

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The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 3

Because the sounding horns were so big, people started to see just how big they could make their hats..

... and he won!

Welcome back! In Chapter 2, we discovered how the phonograph and the gramophone became linked to the music industry. Starting out as a novelty, people began to use it to treasure their favorite music. Unfortunately both the recording methods and the playback left a lot to be desired.

Which is a good segue to kick off our next chapter..

Thanks to the invention of the vacuum tube in 1915, the 20’s saw the record player enjoy 2 big jumps in it’s evolution.
Fittingly the first was in the recording of music and the second was in the playback.

As often happens in highly competitive technological industries, the development of alternatives to the carbon microphone (the transducer used in telephones), happened at relatively the same time from multiple places.

Please note: we will cover the evolution of the microphone in much greater depth in another thread.

The Carbon microphone (or button mike) was invented in 1876 by Emile Berliner a week before Edison, but unfortunately is next to useless to record music with, as it has a terrible signal to noise ratio and woeful frequency range. So as mentioned in part 24, bands would have to crowd together to play before a large recording horn, the loudest instruments were put at the back and the quietest in front.

I always though microphone was a silly name, look they don't resemble small telephones at all!

Although the idea of a condenser mike had been around since the early days of the telephone, it’s very low output made it also next to useless, but thanks to the invention of the vacuum tube amplifier, the problems of output and high impedance were no longer a problem as the sound could be amplified and then sent to drive an electromagnetic recording head.  Suddenly the frequency range that could be recorded grew substantially as did the level of volume that could be played back.

Bands and Orchestras could sit and play in the normal positions, and the change in quality of the recording was magnitudes better.

In 1917, E.C.Wente of Bell Labs developed the first modern condenser microphone, but the early ones were problematic, it was not until the mid 20’s did these

microphones really start to shine. (or was that the the battery powered torch?)

Many competitors such as Western Electric, RCA and Neuman, also started to release condenser mikes and the refinement and evolution of these transducers continues today.

It would have pretty useless to improve the recording quality if you couldn’t hear the difference right?

The worlds 1st electronical record player.. and yes electronical IS a WORD!

Well in 1925 they did that too.
In 1925 Victor introduced it’s Victor Orthophonic Victrola, it was groundbreaking because it was specifically designed to play electrically recorded disks, without going too far into the details, it had a relatively flat frequency response equaling clearer, sharper more vibrant sounding music.

Thanks to wikipedia, here’s a quote from the front page of the New York Times after it’s first public performance.

“The audience broke into applause… John Philip Sousa [said]: ‘Gentleman [sic], that is a band. This is the first time I have ever heard music with any soul to it produced by a mechanical talking machine.’ … The new instrument is a feat of mathematics and physics. It is not the result of innumerable experiments, but was worked out on paper in advance of being built in the laboratory….”

Turntables at the time were operated by a spring driven motor, that the user would have to re-wind for each record played, but as electricity became more prevalent in the home, the clock work motor was replaced by an electric one, and the needle and diaphragm was replaced by a pick up, this was usually a stylus made from steel or sapphire that was attached to a transducer that would then convert the sound to an electric signal. The playing (exponential) horn, was replaced with an amplifier and loud speaker.

In 1927: The Automatic Music Instrument Co introduced a new nifty device – the jukebox .nuff said.

The Great Depression, was a time of much turbulence for most industry’s and the record industry was not spared, unlike music boxes and player pianos/piano players the record industry managed to survive, and return to thrive. Unfortunately not before their were plenty of casualties, with many phonographic and gramophone companies merging or going out of business.

The industry pretty much ground to halt in October of 1929, when Wall Street crashed.

People needed their money for far more important things than buying records, especially as those already with a radio were provided music and entertainment for free.

In fact due to losing massive market share against electronic recording, and elctronical playback gramophones, Edison discontinued the production of phonograph records and their players. Some versions of the story state that Edison who was 82 years old at the time did this the day before the Crash!

To give you an idea just how badly the industry was hit, in 1927, 987,000 machines were produced and 104,000,000  records were sold. In 1932 those numbers dropped to 40,000 and 6,000,000 respectively.

A much older, but much more comfortable looking Edison, By this time he had invented a chair with 4 legs.

In order to try and raise sales in the 30’s record companies started to market collections of music based on 1 genre or performer, these albums of records were specially designed and usually had artwork on the front and liner notes on the back and/or the inside. Most of these albums consisted of 3 or 4 records with each disk having a song on each side. In 1948, when12inch Long Players (LP) started to be released they normally had the same amount of tracks on the 1 disc as the 78rpm albums used to, this is why an LP has come to be known as an album.

The record industry may have survived the Depression, but it’s father Thomas Edison didn’t, he died at the age of 84 in 1931.

And on this rather final note we’ll end our current chapter on the phonograph.

The Phonograph was dead and so was it’s creator. But the gramophone was still alive and in place to become the dominant musical influence of the 20th century.

More will be revealed next in Chapter 4 of our series on the history of the record player. CLICK HERE.

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The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 2

In the last episode we found out about the invention of the first ever, audio recording device, and Thomas Edison’s creation the Phonograph, that started an r-evolution that would change the world.

Today we continue our story looking at an  invention that became the humble record player we know and love today.

In 1886, Charles Sumner Tainter and Chichester Bell invented a device that used wax coated cylinders that were engraved using a vertical method that became known as hill and dale. Their device was named the Graphophone.

Emile's wife was going to kill him when she realized he chopped up the garden hose..

In 1887, Emile Berliner, a German born American came up with a method of using a lateral stylus movement that imprinted it’s vibrations as it moved in a spiral along a zinc disc.
He named this invention the Gramophone. (any one watch the Grammy’s??)

Looking at early patents from Edison, it’s clear that he also considered the idea of recording sound as a spiral on disc, but as the velocity and pressure of the stylus is greater the closer to the middle the disc, he opted to go for the more “scientifically correct” cylinder where the velocity and pressure remain constant.

It’s interesting to note, that Edison didn’t see the phonograph’s primary use as a music player, and initially wasn’t marketed in this way at all.
In a suggested list of it’s 10 most useful applications, Edison listed 8 of them based around the voice for educational, business and archival purposes, only 2 refer to music reproduction including music-boxes and toys. (and none of them refer to using them as placemats in cafes??!)

Despite Edison’s intentions for the Phonograph to become a business machine, by 1889, something of a commercial recording industry had started up. The first phonographic parlor was opened in San Francisco, here customers would select which songs to listen to on their hired phonograph salon.

Initially musicians would have to record into several phonographs at once and keep repeating the performance until enough copies were created to satisfy the demand.The recordings were all made acoustically, the music was recorded through a horn that led to the recording diaphragm.
Both the frequency range and the sensitivity was of  low quality, and wax was a poor medium for capturing music.
Singer’s would almost have to put their face into the recording horn, apparently standard violins were barely usable, but Cello’s and double bases were completely un-recordable.

But despite all this, the novelty value of hearing music jump off a cylinder or disc was immense. The start of the century saw the industry start to pick up speed.

Canned music!

Phonograph cylinders were sold in cardboard tubes, with cardboard lids at each end. These tubes were used to protect the recordings. These containers and the shape of the cylinders (together with the “tinny” sound of early records compared to live music) prompted bandleader John Phillip Sousa to famously make fun of the records as canned music. But he did still record on them.

Click here to hear 1 of Sousa’s recordings.

Berliner’s invention of the gramophone gave the industry a much-needed boost, he also invented a method of creating a matrix (or master disc) that could be used to duplicate almost unlimited copies.

Despite that fact that his first commercial applications were for toys, he quickly realized the gramophones’ musical potential and hired famous musicians to be recorded to promote his discs.

The maximum available duration had a big impact on music of the time.

By the beginning of the 20^th century both cylinder s and the early discs played for 2 minutes.

In 1903 Victor released a 12 inch disc that could record a whopping 3 minutes 30 seconds! This had a massive influence on the duration of commercial music, and to a very large degree is where we get the short radio friendly edits of pop songs today.

Here’s a clip of Jene Bailey’s Orchestra playing “All Aboard For Heaven” c. April 1925 it’s played from a restored 1901 Zon- O-
Phone “Home” disc phonograph or Gramophone.

That’s not to say that longer tracks were not recorded. One of the workarounds to this problem was to release sets of records.  The first multi-record release happened in 1903. HMV England released the very first complete recording of an Opera, Verdi’s ‘Erani’ and it came in a tidy little package of 40 single sided discs!

The Famous His Masters Voice Dog, He'd be 23,000 years old now in dog years.

In America at the start of 1900, there were 2 leading flat disc manufactures that were far bigger than the rest, Columbia whose discs were played at 80 rpm and Victor whose discs played at a speed of 76rpm. The fact that both companies’ discs could be played on each others respective players meant that eventually the speeds met in the middle and 78rpm became the standard for the fist few decades.

So the phonograph and the gramophone had grown up a little, starting as a business machine and a children’s toy respectively, people were starting to enjoy them both as a way of connecting to music. And remember this is all before electricity was used in households!

The next 30 years saw many changes as the industry matured into something the world had never seen before.

Find out what in part 25 CLICK HERE.

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CLICK HERE for the INDEX of History Of Electronic Music

The History of the Phonograph. Chapter 1.

In 2008 something incredible happened in the history of sound.

It was rewritten.

Up until 2 years ago, it was common belief that Thomas Edison was the first person to record sound that was capable of play back.

That was until modern technology “caught up” to the world’s first sound recorder.

The Phonoautograph, you speak in that thingy there and turn that whatsit over there, and then call for help because you ruined it. -image courtesy of firstsounds.org-

In 1855 Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville ,a French printer and bookseller from Paris created the device he called the Phonoautograph. It Consisted of a mouthpiece horn and membrane that was attached to a stylus which recorded the fluctuations of sound on a rotating cylinder that was wrapped in smoke blackened paper. (phew that sentence was almost as long as Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville’s name!)

Unfortunately he wasn’t able to devise a way to play back the sound recorded, (which to my way of thinking is the equivalent of eating some funny mushrooms and then writing down the secret to the universe then afterward not being able to read what what you wrote.)
As a result the phonoautograph was manufactured and sold as a laboratory instrument for analyzing sound. (and the secret to the universe will stay in my 2nd drawer neatly folded until the chosen one with magical reading skills come along).

Just over 150 years later Scientists at Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory in California analyzed a cylinder that Martinville recorded back in 1860. Incredibly, they managing to playback a ten second recording of the French folksong Au Clair de la Lune.

To hear the earliest known recorded sound that was trapped in charcoal for 148 years watch the above youtube clip, or  click here. This is will take you to the home site of the firstsounds.org project.
NOTE: for those wondering. It categorically does not say “Help me! The evil Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville has trapped me in soot for nearly 150 years!”
Because that would just be silly.

Another Frenchman, scientist Charles Cros, conceptualised the phonograph, but was unable to create a working model.
By the time Cros’ theory was made public, Thomas Edison had created a working phonograph.
Thus both Edison and Charles Cross are recognized with independent discoveries of the phonograph. ( A good fact to remember for the pub trivia).

This phonograph was made a long time ago but photographed recently, we know this because it's in c-o-l-o-u-r!

In 1877 Thomas Edison was working on 2 other inventions, the telephone and the telegraph.
While trying to create a machine that would write telegraphic messages,  a “telegraph repeater,” which would “record Morse code signals by indenting dots and dashes on a paper tape,” , he noticed that the tape of  the machine gave off a noise similar to words. Speculating on this, Edison designed a device with the intention to be able to record a telephone message.

At first he used a stretched taught diaphragm attached to an embossing needle that was passed rapidly against paraffin paper, later he refined his design by swapping the paper for a tinfoil wrapped cylinder. It had 2 needles, 1 for writing on to the cylinder and 1 for playing it back, which was achieved by swapping the mouthpiece for a “reproducer” which had a more sensitive diaphragm.

Edison gave this design to his head lab mechanic, John Kreusi, legend has it that Kreusi built it in 30 hours!
On getting his hands on the machine, Edison tested it out immediately by reciting the nursery rhyme “mary had a little lamb”.
Despite expecting some success, he was amazed when the machine spoke his words back to him in a small tinny voice.

.

.

Edison organized a presentation with his good friend, the editor of the Scientific America

Need less to say the folks witnessing were impressed, the following quote is from the same article as quoted above found in the Scientific American Nov.17, 1877.

My favorite of all the recordings can be found in the creative commons it’s of an after dinner Speech at the “Little Menlo” in London.
George Gouraud had come to London to demonstrate Edison’s “Perfected” Phonograph. Gouraud demonstrated the phonograph to various celebrities in a series of Phonograph Parties in the autumn of 1888 and made recordings of their reactions as messages for delivery to Thomas Edison. Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) was one of these guests, and it is his speech to Edison that appears here.

Transcription:

I just love the line that Edmund Yates has his lucid intervals..

You can listen for yourself by clicking on this link Arthur_Sullivan_-_wax_cylinder_recording

Edison may have been the bad boy of the inventer gang, but his 3 legged chair sucked.

Even though interest was great, it would be another 20 years before the world would really take to this world changing invention.

And it truly was, Edison had discovered the fundamental nature of sound.

Sound at it’s simplest description are fluctuations in air pressure.
The effect of vibration (waves) as they are reflected and captured by the minute diaphragm that vibrates in our ear in response.

This means that every sound has it’s own vibrational signature, by speaking into Edison’s Phonograph, the diaphragm vibrates in response to the vibrations of your voice, which is then embossed on the tin foil, playback was basically achieved by reversing the process.

This remains the fundamental method of all analog recording and playback we use today.
(which to me is the equivalant of eating normal mushrooms and writing down the secret to the universe and then everyone being able to read and understand it!)

What happens next? Does Edison’s Phonograph fall into the wrong hands? Does Edouard-of-the-long-french-name succeed in capturing anyone else using just tinfoil and a rubber band?

CLICK HERE FOR PART 24 THE NEXT EXCITING INSTALLMENT INTO THE HISTORY OF THE PHONOGRAPH.

CLICK HERE for the INDEX of History Of Electronic Music

The Reprouducing Piano. ..What! It can have Babies?

No, not really no.

Baby pianos should not be seperated from their mother and like to fed nursery ryhmes and folk songs

But it’s birth was one of proper recorded live music…

In Part 18 we met the player-piano-player family of instruments.

We learned that many felt that the largest and final fault of these instruments was that they were not actually fully automatic, as the player had to control the tempo and interpret what the tempo should be at any moment in the song. It also could not properly replay the subtle dynamic shading’s of master players.

There was another camp of Players that believed that controlling the tempo, interpreting the flow of the music, much like a conductor is the art of playing these instruments.

Non the less, it is true to say that the scrolls that were created, for many, many years, were created by transcribing or translating the musical notation into a system of perforated holes. (holy music anyone?)

While music notation is an incredibly accurate way of recording the mechanics, the mathematics of the music, the map is not the territory.

It cannot describe the dynamics, the soul of the music that is created through slight fluctuations of tempo and dynamics of struck notes.

This type of problem appeared again many decades later, with the invention of sequencers, drum machines and sound generators.
The technology did not fully mature until it could swing the notes, strike the individual tones with slight changes and differences, put a human soul style into the artificial output.

Then what is a Reproducing Piano?  It’s a Piano that can play back or be able to reproduce the performance of a human playing on it or another piano. It effectively records the performance as the changes in notes, tempo and dynamics.

Something to keep in mind, is that Player-Piaono-Players were not seen as passive instruments. These were approached as an accessible interactive musical

Remember this Guy? He's a classic Version of a Piano Player Player, not to get mixed up with a Gangsta Player Player, because then you'll probably get dead.

instrument that were easier to play than any previous music instrument. While the Organette can really be considered the first truly domestic passive automatic instrument but was seen more as a novelty.

This mindset is important to note, because it explains why and how the Reproducing Piano came about more or less as a byproduct or accident.
The earliest versions came about in order to speed up production.

As it was often a very laborious and time consuming job to create the master scroll or stencils, early attempts to notate the scrolls live during a performance we’re mainly created as a way of speeding up the process of creating the music rolls. Even when the master players sat down to record onto these scroll masters, they were often just used as masters and would then be copied by hand (with small variation in where the holes were being created.

The earliest methods, were more used for automatic musical notating that could be used to create a stencil to be cut out by hand afterward.

This should not be under looked, this in fact was probably the first automatic method to record improvisation! (think of of it as a the Protools!)

The First technological breakthrough was the invention of real time perforating machines around 1894. The accuracy of recording the notes was truly amazing when compared to even midi as pianola.org explains;

But this still did not record the pacing and dynamics faithfully as the master.

It was in 1904 that an Instrument Called the ‘Mignon Artistic Player Piano’ came into the world.  Invented by Edwin Welt and Karl Bockisch

ahh the good ole days.. i still remember Aunt Agatha freaking out.. "Cuthbert!" she cried, "someone's stolen all the liquor in the cabinet and replaced it with a piano!"

for the company Michael Welt and Sohne. This German Company was known through out the world for producing beautiful Orchestrons.

It seems that the ‘mignon’ developed out of the technology they used to record the music rolls for automatic organs.

What we know for sure is that they developed an ‘experimental’ piano playing recording device, this device was able to record a piano performance and then through the use of the Mignon Player Piano automatically play it back reproducing the notes, tempo, dynamics, phrasing and pedaling – thus the first reproducing Piano was born.

It was also an unusual thing to behold, as it was not really a piano player, or player piano. It lacked a keyboard and was often described as looking like an ornate sideboard.

Even though mechanically it was a piano, and that other Reproducing Pianos that followed contained keyboards, I believe the ethos of the Welte-Mignon was telling, this instrument was not meant to be played upon. This was a playback instrument, and the companies aim was to record for playback the performances of the finest Piano players alive.

In fact, the excellent Pianola.org has some recordings of just this click here.

The musical capabilities of this new invention brought the attention of many great pianists, and garnered a well-deserved respect very quickly indeed.
One of it’s great recording features was it’s ability to use electric contacts floating on mercury to record the notes played, thus keeping the feel of the keys light for these maestros to record on.

It wasn’t long before the Mignon mechanism was also installed on Steinway’s and Feurich pianos (this time with Keyboard).

Although there were many other competitors that entered the reproducing market, we’re just going to concentrate on one other, the Aeolian Companies reproducing piano the Duo-art.

The Duo-art hit the market 9 years after the Welte-Mignon, this is quite significant given that the Aeolian Company were by far the biggest player (pun intended) in the Player Piano market.

The reason for this tardiness?
Well my initial thoughts were that the chief engineer had dropped his keys behind the piano, and You know how hard it is to get them back out again..

But apparently I was way, way off. (go figure?)

Pianola.org suggests that reasons were 2 in number.

1) A belief that this technology would not take off, because Pianola players wanted to create their own interpretations of this music, rather than sit and listen passively.

2) The developmental/experimental department was occupied with an unfortunate failure -  A synchronized phonograph and player piano.

This once again shows their emphasis on the interactive over the passive.

Unlike the Welte-Mignon, the Duo-Art’s recording process didn’t automatically record the players tempo and dynamics straight from the keys, instead a musical producer would man 2 dials beside the piano that would control the speed and dynamics recorded live onto the perforating machine.
Once a few copies were made, they would be re run the through the machine as a live performance where the producer, the player or the composer himself could control these variations until satisfied with the performance. In some ways the recordings on the Duo-Art can be seen as studio albums, and the Welte-Mignon that of live albums.

Even though it was the phonograph that in the end would later dominate the playback market, their recordings were scratchy and dull at best and required the user to replace the needle itself quite often.

Even to this day, there is something magical about hearing an instrument re-produce live a recording that was captured at another time and place.

Many believe that there is no better substitute to a live performance of  a master Pianist.

The player-piano-player family still survives somewhat today. The music scroll versions mainly due to the it’s rare owners loving care and careful restoration. Thanks to modern technologies like midi, they can be used to interpret live performance or even previously recorded, or notated, and then sent to a perforating machine.

they had to fit a car alarm to this, as the local gang kept nicking it, thinking it was a car stereo..

There are new digital technologies that are available for both the player pianos and piano players, proving that the art – the medium still has something going for it. I believe that that while the piano is envogue these instrument’s will also be around.

We’ll soon be devoting a post to these modern versions in our technology section, so watch out for that.

The fall from mass popularity heralded a new way that modern society related to music, this was reflected in the advertising of the day.

Adverts for Player Pianos and Piano Players always had the people in the picture participating in the experience; suddenly these people were passive, concentrating on the performance.

It’s interesting to note that the active participating in the music has made a come back through computer games and hand held’s.
Games such as the Guitar Hero and Rockband Franchises, allow people to get involved with the music they have previously loved only from a passive listening or active dancing state.

Sure games likes these are seen as a novelty now, but they’re  immensely popular, who knows what new developments are in store for us in the future?

Speaking of the Future, Merry Christmas Everyone and Happy New Year!!!

We start a brand new thread to our tale next chapter Click here for part 20. The Attack of the Automatons!

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CLICK HERE for the INDEX of History Of Electronic Music