Mondo Knows Facts
Early records turned at about 78 revolutions a minute
The figure was never exact, and it varied between companies Records were pressed in shellac mixed with filler, which made them brittle and noisy. A ten inch side held roughly three minutes, which is why early pop songs are short. The standard was common rather than formal, so speeds drifted between labels. It sits in Mondo's music collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
Where this comes from
Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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More facts like this
Berliner's gramophone played flat shellac discsHis lateral cut read a groove that wandered sideways instead of up and downThe long playing record arrived in 1948Columbia's microgroove LP turned at 33 and a third and held about 22 minutes a sideThe cassette was meant for dictationPhilips introduced it in 1963 as a compact, cheap recording mediumEight track cartridges rolled the tape in one loopThe end of the tape simply joined the start, so it played for everWax cylinders lost the first format warEdison backed cylinders while rivals pushed discs that could be stampedFlat discs beat cylindersEmile Berliner's gramophone made records cheap to press and stack
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Tags: formats, shellac, history
Early records turned at about 78 revolutions a minute: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- The figure was never exact, and it varied between companies. The figure is taken from Library of Congress, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a music fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Music shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.