This unique anthology assembles primary documents chronicling the development of the phonograph, film sound, and the radio. These three sound technologies shaped Americans' relation to music from the late nineteenth century until the end of the Second World War, by which time the technologies were thoroughly integrated into everyday life. There are more than 120 selections between the collection's first piece, an article on the phonograph written by Thomas Edison in 1878, and its last, a column advising listeners "desirous of gaining more from music as presented by the radio." Among the selections are articles from popular and trade publications, advertisements, fan letters, corporate records, fiction, and sheet music. Taken together, the selections capture how the new sound technologies were shaped by developments such as urbanization, the increasing value placed on leisure time, and the rise of the advertising industry. Most importantly, they depict the ways that the new sound technologies were received by real people in particular places and moments in time.
- Contents
- General Introduction: Music Technologies in Everyday Life • Timothy D. Taylor
- Part I. Sound Recording
- Introduction • Mark Katz
- Sound Recording: Readings
- Predictions
- The Listener and the Phonograph
- Learning to Listen
- The Phonograph in Everyday Life
- The Phonograph and Music Appreciation
- Men, Women, and Phonographs
- Music and the Great War
- Performers and the Phonograph
- In the Recording Studio
- The Phonograph and Music Pedagogy
- The Phonograph and the Composer
- The Composer in the Machine Age
- The Phonograph as a Compositional Tool
- Phonograph Debates
- Part II. Cinema
- Introduction • Tony Grajeda
- Cinema: Readings
- Technologies of Sight and Sound
- Sounds of the Cinema: Illustrated Song Slides; The Role of the Voice (lecturers, actors); Incidental Musics, Special Effects, Ballyhoo, and Noise of the Audience
- Playing to the Pictures
- Performative Accompaniment
- The Organist of the Picture Palace
- Conducting and Scoring to the Movies
- Taste, Culture, and Educating the Public
- Responding to the Talkies
- Part III. Radio
- Introduction • Timothy D. Taylor
- Radio: Readings
- Radio as Dream, Radio as Technology
- Early Broadcasts: Performer and Listener Impressions
- Radio in Everyday Life
- Economics of Radio Broadcasting
- Music on the Radio
- Con
- Pro
- What Do Listeners Want?
- Crooning
- Radio behind the Scenes
- Getting on the Air
- Talent
- Production behind the Scenes
- Composing for the Radio
- How to Listen to Music on the Radio
- Notes
- References
- Index
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Audio
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