Earliest discs on the market: E. Berliner's Gramophone

[piston]

E. Berliner's Gramophone was the name of the fist company to issue commercial discs, beginning in 1895. Early releases included contralto Vittoria Colombatti, tenor Orazio Cosentino, baritone Adolf Muhlmann, etc., in short excerpts from Faust, Trovatore, Tosca, Lucia, Beiden Grenadiere by Schumann, and Boheme.

The sound was atrocious by today's standards, as illustrated in this 1895 Emile Berliner recording of a popular New York song:

Another interesting feature of this early disc period is how numerous politicians used the medium to disseminate their views, as in the case of Democrat William Jennings Bryan on the "Phillipine" question:

[piston]

According to Julian Morton Moses' Collectors' Guide to American Recordings 1895-1925, Dover Publications, New York, 1949, the earliest orchestral work on disc was recorded by Felix Weingartner and the Columbia Symphony Orchestra, on Columbia Records, A5464, in 1913-14 -- "Tristan: Liebestod" and "Invitation to the Dance" (Weber-Weingartner), presumably during the few years when Weingartner conducted the Boston Opera Company.

[John F]

This is great stuff! Thanks much for finding it and bringing it here.

Julian Morton Moses did a remarkable job with his "Collectors' Guide to American Recordings," and his little book is still a handy reference. But of course recordings weren't just being made in America, and he wasn't able to track down the more obscure American labels. Also, orchestral recordings of classical music were being made and published on discs long before 1913. "The Orchestra on Record, 1896-1926," compiled by Claude Gravely Arnold (Greenwood Press, 1997), runs to 700+ pages in pretty small type! Weingartner's 1913 recording of the "Liebestod" was actually the third of this music on discs (the fourth overall), following two separate versions by the La Scala Orchestra under Carlo Sabajno for the Gramophone Co. (both 1907).

I wish I could say what the earliest commercially published orchestral record was, but Arnold doesn't provide a chronological index, and he doesn't tell us in his introduction. But it was surely of pops concert material. The Edison Symphony Orchestra recorded an abridged "Blue Danube" on an Edison cylincer ca. 1896, and since that matches the opening date in Arnold's title, it might be the one.

[StephenSutton]

Slight corrections: the first disc recordings were made by the Berliner Gramophone Co. founded by Emil Berliner. Later Berliner sold out to Eldridge Johnson, who sacked Berliner, and took legal action to prevent him from making and selling his own invention..Berliner went to Canada and set up. I have just acquired a 1902 Canadian Berliner gramophone in fact. Johnson went on to rename his company 'Victor' , sued everybody in sight to maintain his almost total monopoly and as we all know Victor became RCA Victor, then BMG, then Sony-BMG..
meanwhile in Europe the Berliner company eveolved into The Gramophone Company (HMV).

Zonophone was a competitor set up in 1900-1901 both in the US and all around Europe, by Frank Seaman (an ex Berliner manager). It became quite a threat, and by 1903 had been bought by Victor in the US and by Gramophone everywhere else, and while the name was dropped in the US quickly (and it was always hyphenated there, Zon-O-Phone, in typical American style), it survived in the UK until 1931 when it was merged with Regal, to become Regal -Zonophone. That label survived right up to the mid 1960s.

As to orchestra recordings, there are many early ones, well before 1900, and most of the top operatic discs say ' with orchestra' - however in practice due to acoustic recording methods, until 1924 most 'orchestras' (including well known and studio ones) were all brass and woodwind. Strings were so difficult to record; mostly, instead of normal violins, the pkayers used Stroh Fiddles (with a horn attached to the soundbaord to create more strident and louder tone..

Anyone local to Vermont interested, this is my hobby and obsession and from next spring we plan to have a quite modest phonograph museum and vintage recordngs exhibit, and regular talks and demos... hopefully it will grow gradually. I am busy catalguing over 20,000 records.....................................................

[piston]

OK. For the sake of all of us greenies can you summarize that in a sentence. To my knowledge, Berliner-Zonophone is the original label. Are you saying it ain't? What are your correcting exactly?

[Chalkperson]

Regal-Zonophone lasted until the early seventies...with such Classical Music artists as The Move, Tyrannosaurus Rex and Procol Harum...

[John F]

until 1924 most 'orchestras' (including well known and studio ones) were all brass and woodwind.

Not so. Brass and wind ensembles did make many acoustic recordings, including arrangements of classical music. But string instruments can be heard, clearly if rather dimly and with the basses sometimes reinforced with a tuba, in most orchestral recordings dating from many years before 1924. For example:



Zonophone became the Gramophone Co's and Victor's budget label, didn't it? Their top of the line red label/red seal 78s were very expensive, so in addition to having lower priced labels of its own, the Gramophone Co. brought out really cheap discs by lesser artists on Zonophone. (I don't know much about Victor's Zon-O-Phone; was there any classical material in that catalogue, or just popular music?)

Good luck with the museum and exhibit!

[John F]

The Library of Congress mounted a Berliner exhibition some years back which it has put online, recordings and all. They own about 100 Berliner discs, of which only two are at all classical: Wagner's march "Under the Double Eagle" and a band arrangement of the last section of the William Tell overture. Additionally there is a lot of information about Berliner, his company, and his recordings.

http://www.loc.gov/teachers/classroomma ... -berliner/

[StephenSutton]

Regarding orchestras, John F, you are right and I did say 'most' - where strings were included they were often, as you say, underpinned by woodwind and brass too. I recall working on the 1920 La Scala Faust which we released recently - it was a mighty effort to get the strings audible, but they were there..

Piston: Berliner was the original.. Zonophone was a competitor which did not arrive until 5 years later, after Victor and Columbia. There was never a 'Berliner-Zonophone' label as such. As chalkperson says I should have said that R-Z lasted until the mid 70s for pop, it also was used for Salvation Army recordings from the late 30s until early 60s (blue label).

Yes Zon became the HMV cheap label - but it was still undercut by dozens of German import labels from around 1906-1914, so it was given an even cheaper budget imprint called 'Cinch'. Zonophone itself was a single sided disc, in 1904 they issued a double side label called The Twin. Soon the two were merged, and until around 1916 the label carried both names, as 'Zonophone'Twin' Sorry to be vague but I don't have any of my data books to hand. This all applies in Europe only. As I said, once Zon had been gobbled up in the USA by Victor it only lasted a year or two. I shall stop or I will go on all night.....

[piston]

Did some visual research since my last comment and you're right. They were called "E. Berliner's Gramophone":

[StephenSutton]

yep.. i don't have that one, years ago I started a website label gallery and got quite a few done (i have over 920 different labels - label names that is not color varriations etc) and lost nearly all of it before I learned about backups... all to do again.