Module 3: Rhymes of History

The Rhyme of History product I chose was the
tape recorder. Thomas Edison was the creator
of this sounding machine. It was the
first sound recording of a Nursery Rhyme “Mary had a little lamb”, in 1877 (Congress, 1999). This was the beginning
of sound recording from a tin foil cylinder. By 1907, Edison’s Military band
was recording their live sounds from his New York Recording Plant ( Our New York
Recording Plant, 1906).
The Recording Plant performs many
testing and held many auditions for performing orchestra. The monthly newsletter was more like Tweeter
or Facebook. It was a social networking
tool for Edison and his employees to share the accomplishment around the globe.
Music has always created a form of culture that captures the events of the time
which broke down social barriers (Morton, 2000). For example, the 1920’s recording sounds were
the blues because of the Great Depression.
Earlier in Edison days, the saloon music was placed on a recorder and
played on a piano during Happy Hours.
However, the one recorded sound make the saloon a pleasant environment
for entertainment and drinking.
The Rhyme of History makes emergence technology
in sound recorder a tool that we can utilize today as a market tool to educate,
to create cultural music, and as a communication tool to hear the voices of
today. Today, we are using podcast. It
is naturally the same tool but more advance vehicle to use with
technology. A more advance Web audio
applications use Streaming audio which
enable you to listen to the sound file as it download.
In closing, Dr. Thornburg states the impact of
a new development rekindles something from the distant past (Laureate
Education, 2009).
The player may operate from a different operating system but it does rekindle
something from distant past. It is the sound
recorder which produces repeated sounds.
Reference
Our New York Recording Plant. (1906, November). Edison
Phonograph Monthly, pp. 6-8.
Congress, L. o. (1999, January 13). The History of
the Edison Cylinder Phonograph. Retrieved April 14, 2012, from Library of
Congress: http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/edhtml/edcyldr.html
Laureate Education, I. (Director). (2009). Rhymes
of History [Motion Picture].
Morton, D. (2000). Off the Record: The Technology
and Culture of Sound Recording in America. Piscataway, New Jersey: Rutger
University Press.