ABSTRACT
The technology of electronic music has a longer history than many might imagine. Rudimentary experiments in the electrical production of sound were taking place before the invention of the light bulb. The principles of electricity were hardly understood until the late 1800s. At that time, any discussions of oscillating electrical waves-or oscillating anything, for that matter-were strictly within the purview of science. The German physicist Hermann von Helmholtz, a prominent scientist of the late 1800s, illustrated many of his theories about electromagnetic wave action by using tuning forks and musical demonstrations. It wasn’t long until inventors began to find a way to apply these ideas to the electrical creation of musical sound.
