Produced during the Great Depression, blue shellac Columbia 78 rpm records were deployed to entice people to purchase recordings during difficult economic times. While some used these discs to colour-code certain genres of music within their catalogues, others produced coloured discs for their visual impact alone. Since the early days of commercial recording, record companies have used coloured discs (and cylinders) in order to gain a competitive edge in the market. Reader’s Digest, Park Lane Recordings, ca. Selections from Country & Western Music Jamboree. Hit of the Week, 1136, 1931.įlexible vinyl, 33 1/3 rpm, mono, microgroove, lateral cut, one-sided. Hello! Beautiful! Sam Lanin’s Dance Ensemble. Among the more unusual materials used to produce flexible discs were discarded X-rays, which were used to produce bootleg recordings of “forbidden” music in the Soviet Union during the Cold War, fittingly dubbed “ bone music.”Ĭardboard with Durium acetate resin coating, 78 rpm, mono, coarse groove, lateral cut, one-sided. Vinyl “ flexi discs”, such as this Reader’s Digest disc, were produced on thin sheets of vinyl, and inserted in publications such as books or magazines. Sold at newsstands in the 1930s, “Hit of the Week” cardboard records are early examples of commercially-available “flexible discs”. Flexible discs were made with light and pliable materials in order to allow for ease of distribution, and, occasionally, production. There is seemingly no end to the variety of materials which have been used to record sound onto discs. Also worth noting is the considerable thickness of the Edison Diamond Discs (6 mm as opposed to 2 mm for the average record).Ĭondensite (resin varnish) with wood-flour based core, 80 rpm, mono, fine groove (150 TPI), vertical cut. Although 78 rpm would eventually become the standard, recording speeds varied considerably in the early days of commercial recordings. Edison Diamond Discs were not only produced using this type of groove modulation, but were also made to play at 80 rpm (revolutions per minute). Most discs are recorded with the stylus cutting lateral grooves (side to side), though some, such as Edison Diamond Discs, Pathé discs, and Muzak 16-inch discs have vertical, or” hill and dale” cut grooves (up and down). Berliner Gram-o-phone Co., Victor Talking Machine Company, 31618, ca. Also, this record is recorded on one side only, common to early 78 rpm recordings.īrown shellac, 78 rpm, mono, coarse groove, lateral cut, one-sided. Note the use of brown shellac as opposed to the more common black colouring, showing early experiments with coloured discs. (Victor Talking Machine Company) circa 1907-1908. This 12 inch brown shellac record was released by Berliner Gram-o-phone Co. The round flat disc would eventually dominate the market, and, as a result, Edison would cease production of his cylinders in 1929 1. Edison Blue Amberol Record, 1920, cylinder.Īudiovisual Archives Collection, Marvin Duchow Music LibraryĪs Edison was working on the development of cylinders and phonographs, Emile Berliner was producing the first recordings on flat discs. Edison’s Message (In Morse) to the Telegraph Fraternity. After experimenting with materials and playback technology, Edison released the earliest commercially-available recordings on cylinders as early as the 1890s.īlue celluloid with plaster of Paris core, 160 rpm, mono, 200 TPI (threads per inch), vertical cut. Thomas Edison was the first inventor to successfully record and play back sound on a tinfoil-covered cylinder in 1878.
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