Putting sound recordings into perspective

A type of phonograph

Phonograph

The phonograph record player, or gramophone is a device introduced in 1877 that has had continued common use for reproducing sound recordings, although when first developed, the phonograph was used to both record and reproduce sounds...

 was invented by Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison

Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...

 on 18 July 1877. It used phonograph cylinders as a recording medium. In 1888, Emile Berliner

Emile Berliner

Emile Berliner or Emil Berliner was a German-born American inventor. He is best known for developing the disc record gramophone...

 patented his gramophone which used a flat disk - a gramophone record

Gramophone record

A gramophone record, commonly known as a phonograph record , vinyl record , or colloquially, a record, is an analog sound storage medium consisting of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove...

. The two mediums were at first both used, but by 1910 the disk replaced the cylinder as the most popular recording medium. (Today the words "phonograph" and "gramophone" are sometimes used interchangeably.) Other types of recordings were instrument-specific, such as the pianola (or reproducing piano), which used a piano roll

Piano roll

A piano roll is a music storage medium used to operate a player piano, piano player or reproducing piano. A piano roll is a continuous roll of paper with perforations punched into it. The peforations represent note control data...

 as the recording medium. Edwin Scott Votey produced the first true pianola in 1895.

See also sound recordings

Sound recording and reproduction

Sound recording and reproduction is an electrical or mechanical inscription and re-creation of sound waves, such as spoken voice, singing, instrumental music, or sound effects. The two main classes of sound recording technology are analog recording and digital recording...

.

Early recordings often have low/limited audio quality, since recording technology was just in its beginning phases. It took many years to reach the high standards of audio fidelity known in today's recordings.

History of early classical guitar recordings

At the time of writing, the earliest known classical guitar recording is from cylinders (from the "Viuda de Aramburo" label) featuring guitarists Luis and Simon Ramirez, made in Madrid sometime between 1897-1901. Amongst the works they perform is a piece titled "Estudio para Guitarra", which is today known as "Romance

Romance (song)

"Romance Anónimo" is a piece for guitar, also known as "Estudio en Mi de Rubira" , "Spanish Romance", "Romance de España", "Romance of the Guitar", "Romanza" and "Romance d'Amour" among other names.Its origins and authorship are currently in question...

".

Mexican guitarist Octaviano Yañes performing his "Mexican Dance" (Habanera

Habanera

Habanera may refer to:*"Habanera" , an aria from Bizet's Carmen*Habanera , a 1984 Cuban film*La Habanera , a 1937 German movie...

) on the record, Victor 05662, is dated August 25, 1908. Another version of this piece exists on Edison Foreign Series cylinder (catalogue number 20204). Brazilian guitarist Américo Jacomino Canhoto (1889 – 1828) recorded works in 1913, 1917, 1925, 1926, 1927 and 1928. Mario Maccaferri recorded 8 works in 1929 (Granados: Danza no. 5 (rec. 1929), Bach: Courante (rec. 1929), ref ref2). The Paraguay

Paraguay

Paraguay , officially the Republic of Paraguay , is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to the east and northeast, and Bolivia to the northwest. Paraguay lies on both banks of the Paraguay River, which runs through the center of the...

an guitarist and composer Agustín Barrios

Agustín Barrios

Agustín Pío Barrios , an eminent Paraguayan guitarist and composer, was born in the department of Misiones, Paraguay and died in San Salvador, El Salvador...

 (1885-1944) made recordings between 1913 and 1942, including performances of his own works. Spanish guitarist and composer Miguel Llobet

Miguel Llobet

Miguel Llobet Solés was a classical guitarist, born in Barcelona . Llobet was a renowned virtuoso who toured Europe and America extensively. He made well known arrangements of Catalan folk songs for the solo guitar and is also the composer of original works.-Biography:Some details of Llobet's...

 (1878-1938) made recordings between 1925 and 1929. Garoto (Aníbal Augusto Sardinha) made recordings in the 1950s. Luigi Mozzani (1869–1943) recorded three 78 rpm discs with much of his music. Andrés Segovia

Andrés Segovia

Andrés Torres Segovia, 1st Marquis of Salobreña , known as Andrés Segovia, was a virtuoso Spanish classical guitarist from Linares, Jaén, Andalucia, Spain...

 (1893–1987) made his earliest recordings in 1927. Heitor Villa-Lobos

Heitor Villa-Lobos

Heitor Villa-Lobos was a Brazilian composer, described as "the single most significant creative figure in 20th-century Brazilian art music". Villa-Lobos has become the best-known and most significant Latin American composer to date. He wrote numerous orchestral, chamber, instrumental and vocal works...

 (1887–1959) privately made recordings between mid-1920s and the early 1940s, including important performances of two of his guitar works. Italian guitarist Pasquale Taraffo (1887–1937) made recordings between 1926 and 1930 on a harp-guitar (Taraffo's Sonatina in A Major.). Abel Fleury (1903-58) recorded ten pieces between 1935 and 1954. There exists a recording of Italo Meschi from 1929.

Other early performers who have recorded include Emilio Pujol

Emilio Pujol

Emili Pujol Vilarrubí was a composer and the leading twentieth century musicologist and classical guitar teacher.- Biography :...

, Josefina Robledo (Tárrega: Capricho Arabe, ref), Luise Walker (1910-1998), Julio Martínez Oyanguren (1901-1973) from Uruguay(track - Jota ref), Guillermo Gómez (1880-1955), Maria Luisa Anido

María Luisa Anido

María Luisa Anido was a Spanish classical guitarist. She was born 26 January 1907 in Morón, in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina; she died 4 June 1996 in Tarragona, Spain, and was buried there.-Biography:...

 (1907-1996), Vicente Gomez (1911-2001), Francisco Salinas (1892-1993), Regino Sainz de la Maza

Regino Sainz de la Maza

Regino Sainz de la Maza y Ruiz was a Spanish classical guitarist.At age ten, he got his first guitar and started his musical studies with Santiago Landache , José Nicolás Quesada , and Eugenio Rodríguez Pascual...

 (1896–1981) ( Concierto de Aranjuez, rec. 1948 dedicated to Regino Sainz de la Maza), José Rey de la Torre (1917-1994), Nelly Ezcaray (1920-), etc. Some of the recordings have been reissued on CD.

Julio Sagreras also made radio recordings, though it is not known if the tracks are still available, or if they have been released on CD.

There are probably still more early guitar recordings of high value and historic importance, that can be discovered (e.g. there seems to be a surprising lack of early recordings by Central and Eastern European guitarists, etc.) - possibly in archives of record companies (or discontinued record companies), or in early radio recordings, or in private collections.