Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Das Bilderlexikon der deutschen Schellack-Schallplatten by Rainer E. Lotz

2021; Music Library Association; Volume: 77; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/not.2021.0018

1534-150X

Pekka Gronow,

Digital and Traditional Archives Management

Reviewed by: Das Bilderlexikon der deutschen Schellack-Schallplatten by Rainer E. Lotz Pekka Gronow Das Bilderlexikon der deutschen Schellack-Schallplatten. By Rainer E. Lotz with Michael Gunrem and Stephan Puille. Holste, Germany: Bear Family Records, 2019. [5 vols., 2288 p. ISBN 9783899167078 (hardcover set), €398; vol. 1, 512 p. ISBN 9783899167085; vol. 2, 512 p. ISBN 9783899167092; vol. 3, 464 p. ISBN 9783899167108; vol. 4, 416 p. ISBN 9783899167115; vol. 5, 384 p. ISBN 9783899167122.] Illustrations, appendixes, bibliography. Emil Berliner, the inventor of the gramophone, was born in Germany, where disc records were first sold in 1890. Historically, Germany, the US, and the UK have been the centers of the international record industry. There are many excellent books on the record industry in the US and UK, but so far, Germany has been less studied. This book fills the gap. It is in German, but much of the information is understandable to any reader with a basic knowledge of discography and the history of the record industry. Bilderlexikon translates literally as "Illustrated Dictionary"—a term that brings to mind a coffee-table book for collectors of historical objects. Indeed, according to the publisher, the book has 13,000 illustrations, mostly record labels. But do not be misled by the title. This is a reference book that documents in detail every record company, large or small, that was active in Germany during the era of shellac or 78-rpm records, from 1890 to the mid-1950s. The information has been obtained from primary sources such as trademark registers, the contemporary trade press, and the records themselves. It is a source book on the German record industry for this period. The nearest American equivalent would be Allan Sutton's excellent volume on American Record Companies and Producers, 1888–1950: An Encyclopedia History (Denver: Mainspring, 2018). While Sutton uses 776 pages to document the history of the American record industry, Lotz needs 2,288 pages in larger size to cover roughly the same period. Sutton includes only companies that issued records commercially with some regularity. Advertising records and private productions are not included. By contrast, Lotz and associates attempt to document literally everything: commercial issues, private recordings, advertising records, radio transcriptions, postcard records, manufacturers of blank discs, and even talking dolls with a mechanically recorded sound carrier in their abdomen. With this work, you should be able to trace the origin and date of every German shellac record in any sound archive, private collection, or flea market. Another important difference is that Sutton is limited to domestic US issues, although many companies were also active in South America, [End Page 419] the Far East, and elsewhere. For Lotz, a German record is any record pressed in Germany, even if it was recorded abroad and never marketed in Germany. This increases the scope and value of the book considerably, although it also creates some problems. (Note that "Germany" also includes the former German Democratic Republic, which had a considerable record industry; Austria and Switzerland are not included.) The book is arranged alphabetically by record label. The first is Aachener Bausparkasse, an advertising record issued by the Aachen Building Society. Indeed, a large amount of space is taken by noncommercial releases, which are usually not included in discographies. At first, the amount is bewildering, but gradually a larger pattern emerges, showing how widely records have been used for advertising. Political parties in particular were strong believers in the power of recorded music and speeches, with the Communist and the National Socialist (Nazi) parties among the most active users. Major labels such as Electrola, Grammophon, Odeon, Parlophon, Polydor, and Telefunken have much longer entries, which include lengthy company histories. Companies that did not issue records bearing their own name, such as Carl Lindström A.G., have entries in the alphabetical sequence with references to the labels used. Odeon, one of the principal Lindström labels, was one of the longest-living labels in Germany. It was first introduced by the International Talking Machine Company in 1903. (Lotz gives the date and number of the original trademark application.) It subsequently passed into the hands of Deutsche Odeon, Carl Lindström A.G., and EMI. As far...