The History of Music Recording

It was only 130 years ago when the music recording industry first got its start. In 1878 Thomas Edison invented the phonograph, which recorded sound. Originally planned to relay telegraph messages and for automated speech via the telephone, the phonograph came a year and a half after the telephone.

Edison had figured out that the needle could prick a paper tape and record a message, which led to a stylus on a tinfoil cylinder that played back the message, "Mary had a little lamb, which he had recorded." In reality, the phonograph machine was a tinfoil wrapped cylinder on which sound vibrations could be engraved and played back.

Recordings were being produced in the 1900s by musicians globally. The recording industry became a really serious business by 1910 for anyone who had money. For 90 years, recording, editing and the distribution of music was available only to those with money. The reason is that people could not afford expensive studios with recording equipment.

But by the late 1980s people began experimenting with digital audio processing, and sound vibrations were converted to binary words by computers,so by the 1990s greater bit depths became available. Audio could be better represented digitally, but it took computers with high processing power, and this was still expensive.

Nowadays, the personal computer has become accessible and less expensive, so memory and fast processing speeds that are needed for digital audio are available on almost every computer. Sound cards and audio interfaces have also become cheaper to use. There is software such as Digeaper Design, Garage Band, Reason, Logic Pro, Garage Band, and Audacity. Programs for digital audio recording are now available for free so almost anyone can play around with recording.

Pro Tools software is a favorite go-to tool for many artists. More and more students who are interested in a career in the music recording industry already have experience with audio recording on their home computers.

Students began to realize that there are mentor courses where they can learn from industry pros. At only $7,450 per course, students get a classroom that is a real recording studio in their own town. The courses actually train people for a job in the music recording industry; jobs like recording engineer, music producer or mixer. Some programs include hands-on lab drills in the actual local recording studio where training is conducted by the mentor professional.