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The Story of Recorded Music
For most of human history music existed only while somebody was playing it. Ten questions on the inventions that changed that, and on the styles they carried around the world.
About this topic
Recording turned music from an event into an object. Once a performance could be captured, copied and sold, the whole economics of music changed: musicians could reach people who would never sit in the same room as them, and styles that had been local could travel. Jazz, blues, country and reggae all spread on the back of a physical format. The formats themselves followed one repeating pattern. Somebody works out how to store sound, somebody else works out how to mass-produce copies of it, and the second invention is usually the one that wins. These ten questions cover the key steps and the people behind them, along with a few genres whose origins are often muddled.
Questions & answers
The Story of Recorded Music: all 10 questions and answers
Every question in this quiz is listed below with its correct answer and the reasoning behind it. Play first if you would rather not see the answers — or read through as a study sheet.
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1Who demonstrated the first machine that could both record sound and play it back, in 1877?
- A Alexander Graham Bell
- B Emile Berliner
- C Guglielmo Marconi
- D Thomas Edison Correct
Answer: D. Thomas Edison
Why: Edison's phonograph pressed the vibrations of sound into tinfoil wrapped around a rotating cylinder. He expected it to be used mainly for office dictation and letters, not for selling music.
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2Which format displaced the recording cylinder because copies could be stamped from a master?
- A Magnetic tape
- B The wire recorder
- C The flat disc Correct
- D The piano roll
Answer: C. The flat disc
Why: Emile Berliner's gramophone disc, patented in 1887, could be pressed in quantity from a single metal master. Cylinders had to be recorded more or less individually, which made large print runs impractical.
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3Which company introduced the 33⅓ rpm long-playing record in 1948?
- A EMI
- B Columbia Correct
- C RCA Victor
- D Decca
Answer: B. Columbia
Why: Columbia's microgroove LP held over twenty minutes a side, enough for a substantial classical work without a break. RCA Victor answered the following year with the 45 rpm single, and the rivalry became known as the battle of the speeds.
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4Which British engineer patented the principles of stereophonic sound in 1931?
- A Alan Blumlein Correct
- B Les Paul
- C Robert Moog
- D Rupert Neve
Answer: A. Alan Blumlein
Why: Blumlein's patent for EMI described stereo recording, the cutting of two channels into a single groove, and a microphone technique still used under his name. He died in 1942 during a wartime test flight of airborne radar equipment.
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5Which guitarist pioneered multitrack recording by layering parts on tape in the early 1950s?
- A Chet Atkins
- B Charlie Christian
- C Django Reinhardt
- D Les Paul Correct
Answer: D. Les Paul
Why: Paul recorded part after part on top of his own earlier takes, a technique he called sound on sound. He later pushed Ampex to build a multitrack machine that could record separate parts on separate strips of the same tape.
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6The compact disc standard was developed jointly by which two companies?
- A Philips and Grundig
- B Toshiba and JVC
- C Sony and Philips Correct
- D Sony and Panasonic
Answer: C. Sony and Philips
Why: The two agreed a common specification in 1980, published as the Red Book, rather than fighting a format war. It set the sampling rate at 44.1 kHz, a figure chosen so that digital audio could be stored on existing video tape equipment.
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7Jazz emerged in the early twentieth century above all in which American city?
- A Memphis
- B New Orleans Correct
- C Chicago
- D New York
Answer: B. New Orleans
Why: New Orleans had the brass band tradition, the blues and ragtime all in one place, and a mixed population that put them together. Musicians moving north in the 1920s carried the style to Chicago and then everywhere else.
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8Reggae developed in which country during the late 1960s?
- A Jamaica Correct
- B Trinidad and Tobago
- C Cuba
- D Ghana
Answer: A. Jamaica
Why: Reggae grew out of the earlier Jamaican styles of ska and rocksteady, slowing the tempo and pushing the guitar onto the offbeat. The recording studios of Kingston, and the sound systems that played their records in the street, drove the whole thing.
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9Robert Moog is remembered for making which instrument practical for working musicians?
- A The electric guitar
- B The drum machine
- C The electric organ
- D The voltage-controlled synthesizer Correct
Answer: D. The voltage-controlled synthesizer
Why: His modular instruments of the mid-1960s, and the portable Minimoog that followed, turned synthesis from a laboratory curiosity into something a performer could carry. The album Switched-On Bach, released in 1968, showed the general public what the machines could do.
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10Which style, dominated by piano composers such as Scott Joplin, takes its name from its syncopated or "ragged" rhythm?
- A Stride
- B Dixieland
- C Ragtime Correct
- D Boogie-woogie
Answer: C. Ragtime
Why: Ragtime placed a steady left-hand beat under a right hand that deliberately landed off it. It sold in enormous quantities as printed sheet music in the years around 1900, before recording was widespread, with Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag the best known example.
Frequently asked questions about The Story of Recorded Music
How many questions are in The Story of Recorded Music?
The Story of Recorded Music has 10 questions and takes about 7 minutes to finish. It is rated Medium and sits in our Music category.
How is The Story of Recorded Music scored?
Each of the 10 correct answers adds 10 XP, up to 100 XP for a clean run. Wrong answers cost you nothing, and your full question-by-question review is shown at the end.
Are the answers to The Story of Recorded Music explained?
Yes. All 10 questions carry a written explanation of why the correct answer is right, so the quiz works as a study sheet as well as a test.
Can I replay The Story of Recorded Music?
Yes, as often as you like. The questions and the answer options are reshuffled on each run, and you can use Practice Mistakes afterwards to retry only the ones you missed. No account is needed to play.
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