An Early 20th-Century Research Physicist Looks to the Past and Future of Recorded Music

By By sarah Thorngate 
Published on April 1, 2009
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“Not the least wonder of science is its ability to convert shellac–excreted by an insect–into a vehicle for profound emotional experience,” wrote research physicist George R. Harrison in the November 1938 issue of Technology Review. The January/February 2009 issue resurrects his spirited description of the industrial process behind phonographs and his prescient thoughts on the ways improved recording technology could change the art of music making.