Music Technology      Hey all you music fans!  You may not choose to believe it but there weren't always Compact Discs.  In fact, there wasn't any recorded music until the year 1877! Read On to find out more. Music makes its mark      Well, I guess I should start at the beginning.  Way back in the Ice Age, they did listen to "music".  (It was actually an assortment of beats played on an animal skin drum.)  You either had to go hear this live, or make it by yourself.  That was the way for thousands of years.
     Then in 1877, Thomas Edison (Remember him?) made the first recording of the human voice.  He sang "Mary Had a Little Lamb".  (Rumor has it that the word "Hello" was first recorded on a paper cylinder on the Telegraph repeater.  Unfortunately, The paper did not survive.) The tin foil recordings were almost impossible to reproduce.
  Music for everyone!         The graphaphone was a big invention in the year 1885.  It was invented by Alexander Graham Bell and George Tainter using wax Cylinders with vertical grooves cut into the sides.  Ten years after the first recording, the gramophone was invented. It played only one record-like one-sided seven-inch disk and had to be turned by a crank.  They were later replaced by the Victor Company's motorized version of the gramophone.
     The gramophone's disks broke easily and some one thought of the idea of making them stronger.  This started a new era in music.  The next big discovery were shellac disks.  They were more durable, but heavier and still broke under pressure.  In 1901, Thomas Edison decided to bring his tin foil cylinder back, but innovated by making them out of steel.  He called them "Mold Gold".  They weighed a lot but were virtually impossible to destroy.  They did not last long popularity wise and were later that year replaced by the "Red Seal" records By Victor Company.  (Victor Company Is also called RCA Victor records and have the "Little Nipper" dog listening to the phonograph as a trademark.)  People keep making these stronger and longer lasting.  In the late twenties, people in many     countries decided to get together for a new music listening method        Records bite the dust      In the thirties, inventors over in Europe stumbled across something amazing.  They could use thin strips of paper to make music!  (They broke VERY easily and the player took up an entire room.)  the world wasn't ready for that, though, so people continued to dance to records.  Then, sometime in the 70's, The same people invented a little thing called the 8-track. (Your parents might have a few stashed up in the attic.)  They looked a lot like today's video tapes, but a bit smaller.  In the eighties, American inventors borrowed the basic design of the 8-track and made it smaller in size and larger in capacity. In other words: more music for you.
     Last, but defiantly not least, came the Compact Disc.  They resemble the records played on the Victrola, but CD's only have one side.  They are read by lasers, and soon will be available in different sizes!  What will those zany inventors think of next?
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