25 years ago today a revolution was begun. Some shrugged off the new media as the generation before them had shrugged off The Beatles. (“Rock and Roll won’t last.”)
The first compact disc was pressed in Germany by the Philips factory, a division of Polygram. Overlooking their unfortunate choice for first pressing — ABBA’s The Visitors – the first music CD manufactured on August 17, 1982 ushered in a new technological age, moving us away from analog and into the realm of digital. The original compact disc was designed to hold 60 minutes of music. (The 8GB iPod nano, which holds 2000 songs, wasn’t yet a glimmer of a dream.) As much of the early CD catalog was classical, Philips and Sony extended that capacity to 74 minutes . . . long enough to accommodate the complete performance of Beethoven’s 9th Symphony.
Thank you, Ludwig.
