Pilgrimage in Music Part 1: 19th Century Music Facts & Events

1860 Eduard-Leon Scott invents the phonautograph and makes the first visual recording of sound

1867 The first collection of "Slave Songs of the United States" is published



1877 Thomas Edison invents sound recording, and a phonograph to play sound recorded on cylinders. It had two diaphragm-and-needle units, one for recording, & one for playback. When he spoke into the mouthpiece, the sound vibrations were indented onto a metal cylinder with tin foil wrapped around it by the recording needle in a vertical groove pattern. The first words recorded and played back were "Mary had a little lamb...", spoken by Edison. He filed for the patent on December 24, 1877.

1880 The tango is born in Buenos Aires

1885 Benjamin Franklin Keith and Edward Franklin Albee set up a nation-wide chain of vaudeville theaters

1887 Emile Berliner builds the first gramophone, that plays sound recorded at 78 RPM on a flat record

1889 Columbia is founded by Edward Easton


For a more detailed music timeline, you can visit www.scaruffi.com/music