1909 technology, and the business side

[Kimbaby57]

Hi, not sure if this is the right forum for my question. I’m writing a story set in 1909. The characters are music hall composers. Does anyone know the correct name for the discs and cylinders that were used for parlaphones and gramophones? And, does anyone know about the “business side?” Copyright, royalties, mechanical rights, performing rights, etc? I believe it was all in a state of flux. Kind of like today’s streaming issues…

[recordmaker]

Good to see some research on this as it is often missed out

As you mention Music Hall I assume are you writing about the British isles in this era hence this section of the forum?
By composers do you mean songwriters?
By parlaphones do you mean phonographs?
And if so you also need to get your expressions from a British source as the distinctions of phonographs ( cylinders) from gramophone ( discs ) is is certainly a British thing as the American term is generically Phonograph until the evolution of the Victor Victrola.

There was no record copyright in Britain until 1912 however sheet music and performance rights were well established
there would have been a range of commercial arrangements and many songwriters sold the rights outright to the performer of shared the rights with the performer depending on there working relationship, Billy Williams worked a lot with Godfrey as his songwriter and is I think given a writers credit for songs he paid for and used.

A few trade journal from Great Britain and published in that year would be best for being sure what the trade called the products and machines, 1909 is possibly after the peak period ( 03-05 )when the trade was known as the talking machine business and there had been a bit of a crash in 06 07 removing some of the cylinder companies and consolidating the disc in the UK.

[Kimbaby57]

Record maker,

Thank you -- that's some of what I'm trying to sort out. The characters are song writers. One is married to a performer. So, originally the sale of his sheet music was promoted by her exclusive performance rights in the halls. But then with the advent of talking machines / mechanical players, there was another source of potential income for: writers of the songs, performers of the songs, publishers of the sheet music, publishers/reproducers of the discs or cylinders to be played on the machines. I've been scanning Music Hall and Theatre Review, The Stage and The Era, but there might be other trades that explain it better. I'm not sure what they are. But thank you for the correct names. Yes, from a British perspective, even though I'm in the U.S..... - Kim

[recordmaker]

The popular was not paid for by the record companies and the performers were paid per session as far as I know. The only per performers with royalties were operatic singers like Tamango and Nellie Melba and their records were really expensive over 10 times the price of the popular material ( 20 shillings vs 1shilling and sixpence for a cylinder or 2 shillings and sixpence for a disc ) weekly working man's pay 20 to 30 shillings.

the main point about the recording studios was that you could work during the day before the Halls opened and pick up a little or a lot of extra income per session depending on the popularity of the records.

The only problem was that some companies would just get cover versions made of your song if they did not want to pay the original artiest pay.

for reference Clarice Mayne wrote and performed with her husband and made records

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarice_Mayne

see Talking Machine News ( 1903-1930 ) now online 1904-1908 but you have to sign up I think.

https://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co. ... chine-news