The Long Player

On June 21st, 1948 Columbia Records, gave a press conference at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City to launch the 33 1/3 long playing record. While there was great secrecy surrounding the event, Columbia still had over 100 titles ready to release by July 1.  At their Dealer Conference in Atlantic City on June 21 a company executive gave a speech while an LP of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite was playing, which everyone could see via a large mirror suspended above the turntable.  At the end of the 18-minute side, (more than 4 times longer than an existing 78 rpm record) the crowd gave a standing ovation! Within a year one million American homes would have the equipment to play LPs, the revolutions revolution had begun.

LPs were being sold at $4.95 each and to encourage sales of the necessary turntables to play them a Philco player was sold for $29.25 with three free LPs - a neat piece of marketing. One of those to benefit from all this was Sinatra, in that his LP, The Voice of Frank Sinatra, that became the first Pop LP, Columbia CL6001. The first classical LP was The Beethoven Violin Concerto with Nathan Milstein, Bruno Walter and the Philharmonic Symphony of New York.