When was edisons phonograph invented

Patent No. In an effort to facilitate the repeated transmission of a single telegraph message, Edison devised a method for capturing a passage of Morse code as a sequence of indentations on a spool of paper. Reasoning that a similar feat could be accomplished for the telephone, Edison devised a system that transferred the vibrations of a diaphragm—i. Edison and his mechanic, John Kreusi, worked on the invention through the autumn of and quickly had a working model ready for demonstration.

Thomas A. Edison recently came into this office, placed a little machine on our desk, turned a crank, and the machine inquired as to our health, asked how we liked the phonograph, informed us that it was very well, and bid us a cordial good night. The patent awarded to Edison on February 19, , specified a particular method—embossing—for capturing sound on tin-foil-covered cylinders.

His newly established Bell Labs developed a phonograph based on the engraving of a wax cylinder, a significant improvement that led directly to the successful commercialization of recorded music in the s and lent a vocabulary to the recording business—e.

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One of Edison's main competitors, the Victor Talking Machine Company, became extremely popular in the early years of the 20th century by selling recordings contained on discs. Eventually, Edison also moved from cylinders to discs. Edison's company continued to be profitable well into the s. But finally, in , sensing competition from a newer invention, the radio , Edison shut down his recording company. By the time Edison left the industry he had invented, his phonograph had changed how people lived in profound ways.

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Share Flipboard Email. Introduction The American Industrial Revolution. Robert McNamara. History Expert. Robert J. McNamara is a history expert and former magazine journalist. He was Amazon. Featured Video. Cite this Article Format. McNamara, Robert. Edison's Invention of the Phonograph. Thomas Edison's Greatest Inventions. Biography of Thomas Edison, American Inventor. Emile Berliner and the History of the Gramophone.

History's 15 Most Popular Inventors. Elisha Gray and the Race to Patent the Telephone. Important Innovations and Inventions, Past and Present. The Most Important Inventions of the 19th Century. In reality, neither critic was right. During the first two decades of the phonograph—from to —the number of music teachers and performers per capita in the U.

The phonograph inspired more and more people to pick up instruments. This was particularly true of jazz, an art form that was arguably invented by the phonograph. Previously, musicians learned a new form by hearing it live. Indeed musicians were often egregiously ripped off—particularly black ones.

Even in jazz, an art form heavily innovated by black musicians, some of the first recorded artists were white, such as Paul Whiteman and his orchestra.

Financial arrangements were not much better. Black artists were given a flat fee and no share in sales royalties—the label owned the song and the recording outright. Indeed, Ralph Peer suspected that they were so thrilled to be recorded that he probably could pay them zero.

He kept artists in the dark about how much money the labels were bringing in. When radio came along, it made the financial situation even worse: By law, radio was allowed to buy a record and play it on the air without paying the label or artist a penny; the only ones who got royalties were composers and publishers.

It would take decades of fights to establish copyright rules that required radio to pay up. Because, as she argued in a Wall Street Journal article , streaming services pay artists too little: less than a penny per play. In an open letter to Apple online, Swift lacerated Apple, and the company backed down. Technology, it seems, is once again rattling and upending the music industry.

Not all artists are as opposed as Swift is to the transformation. Indeed, digital music is, ironically, bringing back the primacy of live shows: The live-music touring market in the U. Even he seems to have intuited the power of that invention. Edison was once asked, of your thousand-fold patents, which is your favorite invention? Photo: Tom Igoe.

Simone Massoni These days music is increasingly free—in just about every sense of the word. Are these trends a good thing—for musicians, for us, for the world of audible art? Post a Comment.