Turn UP the Volume and Rattle the Dishes

Edison invention of 1870
Eight Track
33 1/3; 1948-1990, 78; 1900-1960,45; 1949-1990
Cassette tape

Do you remember listening to the radio when it was battery operated and you only played it at certain times to conserve the power? Like Saturday night?

Did you have a phonograph with cylinder records that you would and the sound came through a bell or sometimes called a horn?

How about an upright crank phonograph?

Did you have a little record player that played one song at a time, generally 45's purchased at the local music store for 89 cents. It was a place where all the teens hung out and listened to their favorites in booths and Susie Durgin rang up your sale. Did you have a little unit like this? Did you get it as a gift?

Did your parents sell the never played piano to have room for a hi fi? Where they taught to set the speakers to make the perfect spot to sit to hear the music? If so, did you have to listen to Glenn Miller when you really wanted Elvis to rock the room? Long playing records were $4.95. Just where was that spot? In the middle of the room, of course!

And when stereo came in, did they have a cabinet with black and white television, a radio, and stereo speakers called woofers and twitters? Where you allowed to play it? Or where they certain you would ruin the needle?

When my parents built their last house in the mid seventies, they installed a speaker system. In the office, on the shelf, there was an eight track player. I wonder if the person that bought the house hooked up the latest technology to the speakers. Is bigger better?

And then there were cassettes. Did you ever have to try to rewind one?

And cars in the 90's had cassette players. And compact disks came out and conversion kits were available to makecompact disks play externally.

Alas, cars manufactured five years ago do not have a mp3 player plug in. Perhaps conversion kits are available. My son plugs his IPOD© into the dash and plays his music. Is there a radio in the car?

If a seven year old can get off a plane rocking to a Bratz© mp3 player, why can't her grandfather do the same. Well, more like a shuffle! (We had our dance to Unchained Melody last night and a glass of wine to toast our lives together--we both shuffled).

Think about 45's left in the back window of the car and how they warped in the sun. Think about the long playing records you wore out. Think about the eight track that your son thought was a bank and put money in to 'hide'. Think about rewinding cassettes because they got chewed up and how one tried to splice the tape with cellophane tape and how it didn't work. Looks at your CD's which you bought early in its marketing and how scratched they are from hours of listening. Think about how much space all of these items take/took.

cylinders

78

45

hi fi

stereo

33 1/3

8 tracks

cassettes

compact disks

mp3

If you look around your graveyard of music, what will you find? Tom rebuilt a phonograph with a bell, there are a couple dozen clay cylinders safe behind glass in a book case. There are stacks and bags of 45s in the garage, there are 123 long playing albums, 6 zippered cases of cassettes, a couple hundred compact disk. Most of it, with intervention, can be transferred to an IPOD©.

Will young children of today even know what I am talking about? Will grand children think of the bell on the old phonograph as only a place to display dried roses?

Will she ever have the privilege of going to the music store and flipping through the stacks? Or reading album covers? Does it matter? Won't she miss seeing the cute guys and the jocks at Larson's? OOOO.

Have we come to the point where we can down load music for $10.00 an album/CD and are CD's going to be another thing a seven year old doesn't know about? Is there a craft project looming?

I was one lucky kid.

I listened to:

my grandparents music

my parents music

my own music

I am an unlucky adult

I have not listened to:

A seven year olds music favorites

Why update? Because it exists.

Is this noteworthy?

e