Music recorded in 1893

Music recorded in 1893

The year 1893 was the year when the conditions for the technology of recording and playback to move from the stage of "preserving sound" to "distributing as part of the city's entertainment infrastructure" were simultaneously put in place in multiple areas. Reading the history of recording not just as a history of technology, but in conjunction with changes in urban culture, consumption, and the international order, makes it easier to see the connections between these events.

A symbolic example is the World's Columbian Exposition (May 1–October 30, 1893) held in Chicago. Electrification, machinery, exhibits, and entertainment were integrated into a huge venue, giving visitors the experience of "the city itself becoming a show." The Ferris Wheel (1893), designed by George Washington Gale Ferris Jr. (1859–1896), demonstrated the potential of large-scale structures to organize the time and gaze of the public. Furthermore, the Parliament of the World's Religions (September 11–27, 1893), which featured Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902), highlighted the establishment of international "narratives" and "audiences."

In the visual media field, too, a commercial model based on repeated viewing emerged. In the lineage of Thomas A. Edison (1847–1931) and William K. L. Dickson (1860–1935), the film studio Black Maria was completed in 1893, and a public demonstration of kinetoscope-type images was held in May of the same year. The establishment of images as "entertainment to be viewed through a machine" overlapped with the foundation for the spread of sound as "entertainment to be heard through a machine."

Meanwhile, the Panic of 1893 was raging in the United States, with credit crunch and bankruptcies hitting people's lives hard. Grover Cleveland (1837–1908) placed importance on maintaining the gold standard and moved to repeal the Sherman Silver Purchase Act, which was seen as a source of currency instability. The repeal act was passed on November 1, 1893. While the economic recession dampened entertainment consumption, it also created a demand for relatively cheap, easily reproducible forms of entertainment, and sound recordings began to take on a more commercial nature.

In international politics, "overthrow" and "delineation" progressed simultaneously. The Hawaiian Kingdom was overthrown on January 17, 1893, and Queen Liliʻuokalani (1838–1917) was forced to abdicate. In South and Central Asia, the Durand Line, known as the Agreement of November 12, 1893, established a border framework negotiated by Henry Mortimer Durand (1850–1924) and Abdur Rahman Khan (c. 1844–1901). In Southeast Asia, the conflict between the French Third Republic and the Kingdom of Siam culminated in the Franco–Siamese Treaty (October 3, 1893), and in southern Africa the First Matabele War (October 1893–) began.

In terms of social institutions, women gained the right to vote in New Zealand. The Electoral Act was passed on September 19, 1893, marking the culmination of a movement led by Kate Sheppard (1847–1934). The expansion of "participation" in mass society progressed at the same rhythm as the expansion of entertainment and media audiences.

The sense of the fin de siècle was also evident in the arts. Antonín Dvořák's (1841–1904) Symphony No. 9 “From the New World” premiered in New York on December 16, 1893, and Edvard Munch's (1863–1944) “The Scream” (1893) became established as an iconography of anxiety. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840–1893) died on November 6 of the same year. In terms of natural disasters, the 1893 Sea Islands hurricane caused great damage to the southeastern United States on August 27, 1893.

As we have seen, 1893 was a year in which the expansion of spectatorship, the commercialization of new media, changes in consumption patterns due to economic recession, and the drawing of new lines in the international order all coexisted. If we view the history of recording not just as a matter of technological advancement but also as the formation of a system for the distribution of entertainment and information in society, the events of that year can be read as turning points that mutually complement each other.

Discography of Etching the Voice: Emile Berliner and the First Commercial Gramophone Records

These recordings are included in the discography of "Etching the Voice: Emile Berliner and the First Commercial Gramophone Records," a collection of Berliner's early commercial recordings, and the recording years are all listed as "1890-95."

Title	Artist
Alfred Jones [version 2]	n/a
Auld Lang Syne	n/a
Blue Bells of Scotland	n/a
By thy cold breast (Byron's “Manfred”)	n/a
Czarenlied, from “Czar und Zimmermann”	n/a
El Credo	n/a
Father William	n/a
The Flowers that Bloom, from “The Mikado”	n/a
Fra Diavolo	n/a
Gesänge	n/a
God Bless the Prince of Wales	n/a
God Save the Queen!	n/a
Gramophone	n/a
Hark! The Herald Angels Sing	n/a
Hobellied	n/a
Home! Sweet Home!	n/a
I Due Ladri e l'Asino	n/a
In the Sweet By-and-By	n/a
Jägers Abschied	n/a
La Boiteuse	n/a
La Marseillaise	n/a
La Rondinella	n/a
Le Corbeau and le Renard	n/a
Le Père la Victoire	n/a
Lena, la bella Lena	n/a
A Little Ship Was on the Sea	n/a
Long, Long Ago	n/a
Me Gustan Todas / Aroro Mi Nena	n/a
The North Wind	n/a
Numeri, La Settimana, Le Mesi	n/a
Numeros, Dias, Meses	n/a
Old King Coal	n/a
Old Mother Hubbard	n/a
Pilgrims' Chorus, from ’Tannhäuser“	n/a
Proverbs	n/a
Rule, Britain!	n/a
Sing a Song of Sixpence / Oh, Carry Me Back	n/a
Sing a Song of Sixpence [3-in doll disc]	n/a
Ta-ra-ra Boom-de-ay!	n/a
Versos y Canto	n/a
We don't want to fight [version 2]	n/a
Whist! The Bogie Man	n/a
Who Killed Cock Robin?	n/a
Willow Tit-Willow, “from The Mikado”	n/a
Wot Cher!	n/a

These are the earliest Gramophone discs, thought to have been recorded mainly in London and Hanover, and are a core group of sound sources from the "disc side of the 1890s," a lineage separate from the Edison cylinder lineage.

Ruben Collection

The Ruben Collection (Ruben-samlingen) is a collection of Denmark's earliest wax cylinder recordings, produced in Copenhagen by Gottfried Moses Ruben (1837–1897) between 1889 and the mid-1890s. MOPM has collectively organized the wax cylinder recordings made between 1889 and the mid-1890s as the "Ruben Collection," and has posted a list of the recordings on a dedicated page.

Ruben-samlingen

This is a list of the Ruben Collection (Ruben-samlingen)

museum-of-pop-music.com