The phonograph effect: The influence of recording on listener, performer, composer, 1900-1940.

Abstract

Sound recording has long been understood first and foremost as a preservational tool. Yet it is also a catalyst---one linked to profound changes in the music and musical culture of the twentieth century. This dissertation explores the catalytic nature of recording and investigates its influence upon three central musical activities: listening, performing, and composing. The manifestations of recording's influence are described in this work as phonograph effects: the observable responses of listeners, performers, and composers to sound recording's distinctive traits. The responses that constitute phonograph effects are directed specifically toward traits of the medium that distinguish it from live music making. That recorded musical performances can be repeated exactly, and that listeners cannot see the performers whose recorded music they hear, are two such traits. A straightforward example of a phonograph effect is Igor Stravinsky's decision to compose the movements of his <italic>Serenade in A</italic> for piano (1925) to fit the playing time of 78-rpm records. Stravinsky's response (limiting the length of the <italic> Serenade's</italic> movements) was directed toward an aspect of the technology (the durational constraint of recordings) that differs from live performance (in which no strict limitations exist). The three chapters of this study investigate the role of recording in the reception, performance, and composition of music in the first decades of the twentieth century. Chapter 1 documents the reception of the phonograph in the United States between 1900 to 1930, and its impact on musical listening in American homes, schools, and communities. Chapter 2 considers recording's influence on violin performance practice, specifically in the use of vibrato, rubato, and portamento. Chapter 3 comprises independent case studies that explore Igor Stravinsky's attitudes towards recording, phonograph-specific music in theory and practice between 1910 and 1932, and the role of recording in the development of jazz. This work draws upon a variety of primary sources, including musical manuscripts, consumer questionnaires, phonograph advertising, interviews with performers and composers, and historic recordings.