Re: [ARSCLIST] Stereo records.

[steven c <stevenc@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Michael Shoshani" <mshoshani@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> On Friday 16 June 2006 10.08, Steven Smolian wrote:
> > The issue is quite complex.  I have an Edison cylinder cartalog from
1891.
> >
> > Read, read, read.
> >
> > Get hold of "From Tinfoil to Stereo" in any edition except that revised
by
> > Leah Burt (she chopped out much important data._
>
> I've been familiar with Tinfoil for 30 years, and have had the 1976
edition
> for nearly that long :) (I cut my teeth on the late 1950s version, along
with
> Roland Gelatt's "The Fabulous Phonograph".)
>
> I was quibbling with an RCA trade advert that claimed that RCA Victor
invented
> the phonograph and record industry.  Edison was issuing cylinders in 1891,
> yes, BUT... Edison, Columbia, and a host of smaller regional phonograph
> companies, were issuing pre-recorded cylinders several years before that.
> Part of the North American Phonograph alliance was to promote the sales of
> pre-recorded music, in both graphophone and cylinder formats until the
> smaller graphophone cylinder died a natural death.
>
> I credited the Bell-Tainter Graphophone specifically because until it
> appeared, the Edison Phonograph had lay dormant for the better part of a
> decade. Once someone started tinkering with his favorite invention, The
Old
> Man set about improving his own machine with, among other things, the
solid
> wax cylinder that eventually permitted moulded pre-recorded records to
exist
> in the first place. The Graphophone cylinder was woefully inadequate for
its
> task, but because it was introduced it spurred Edison to come up with the
> records and phonographs that became the recognized standard. WIth that,
the
> sound recording industry began to take shape as local and regional
companies
> began issuing their own standardized recordings.
>
I had always understood that the first pre-recorded cylinders were probably
offered in 1889, but that the earliest list of offered cylinders was dated
in early 1890?

Steven C. Barr