More than a hundred years ago, just as the recording industry was being established, musicians were up in arms. If their music could be preserved and then played back at will by anyone, anywhere at any time, wouldn’t it mean they’d soon be out of work? Playing records on the radio? BAD! Talking movies with soundtracks? BAD! Recording music at sporting events, theatre productions and military displays? BAD!
As far as musicians and musicians’ unions were concerned, all these new-fangled takin’ machines were KILLING JOBS! SAD! It was the end of marching bands, orchestras, dance bands, vaudeville, singers–the lot. And there were plenty of people who were willing to do whatever it took to MAKE MUSIC GREAT AGAIN! That included a two-year strike in the early 1940s, where no new records were supposed to be made.
It took the President of the United States to step in—during WW II, no less—to sort things out.
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