Practice using capital letters while learning about big changes in the ways we enjoy music.
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1. for most of human history, listening to music meant hearing someone play an instrument live. or, if you had musical skills, you could play your own Jams!
2. In 1877, Thomas edison, an inventor from new jersey, designed one of the first machines that could play and record music. the first sound he recorded? a line from a nursery rhyme: “mary had a little Lamb.”
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3. by the mid-1900s, about 80 percent of People in america owned radios. radio DJs would play music over the airwaves. but if you wanted to hear a specific song, you had to call them by phone and request it!
4. You couldn’t carry your favorite music in your pocket until 1979, when the company sony introduced the walkman. With the walkman, you could pop in a cassette tape and listen on the go to popular bands like the rolling stones!
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5. shiny disks called CDs took off in the 1980s, replacing cassettes. all the CDs ever sold could circle the planet six times!
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6. in 2001, the tech company apple changed music listening forever with a portable music player that used digital files—just like your phone, if that’s how you listen to music!
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7. The music streaming service spotify was launched in sweden in 2008. today, you can listen to millions of artists on spotify, including olivia rodrigo. One of her songs was streamed more than 1.1 billion times in 2021, more than any other song!
This article was originally published in the March / April 2022 issue.
