How did singers record?

[MisterGramophone]

For a while now, I have been wondering how did singers record on acoustic records? I knew they had wax discs on an upright gramophone with a horn, what is the corn even connected to? What is the sensitive membrane that records the audio, I am trying to do some acoustic recordings and I’m confused about this part of the process and how they made the paper label and made a shellac copy.

[recordmaker]

Try this first

(Double-click the video above or click this link to go to the video on YouTube.)

Disc making normally uses a disc recording lathe with a feed screw to drive the cutter head to create the spiral rather than a normal gramophone with a free moving tone arm. Many domestic cylinder machines can be used to make acoustic recordings and play them back and is the quickest way to learn the process.

The diaphragm on the disc recorder is not much different to the one on a sound box ( mica or glass ) and they are not particularly sensitive, professional singers a the time were trained to sing loud enough to entertain a lot of people amplification which of course had yet to be available.

[MisterGramophone]

I do have a very loud natural voice, the challenge is trying to record without a lathé to make a shellac disc with a wax dub.

[recordmaker]

Do you understand that the machine must cut an even spiral groove on the blank disc and that a gramophone does not allow you to do that?

A cylinder phonograph is the quickest and easiest way to experience acoustic recording as it has a feed screw.

[MisterGramophone]

I feel that cylinder phonographs are both overpriced and difficult to find the records, blanks, and a machine that doesn’t have a broken recording head.