Sound Recording Predates Edison Phonograph
Recorded in 1860 - Someone singing part of 'Au Clair de la Lune.'
Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville invented the phonautograph in 1857. National Museum of American History, Smithsonian Institution hide caption
Thomas Edison wasn't the first person to record sound. A Frenchman named Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville actually did it earlier.
He invented a device called the phonautograph, and, on April 9, 1860, recorded someone singing the words, "Au clair de la lune, Pierrot repondit." But he never had any intention of playing it back. He just wanted to study the pattern the sound waves made on a sheet of paper blackened by the smoke of an oil lamp.
A group of researchers found some of his old phonautograph papers and used a computer program to play the recording. They are presenting it publicly for the first time on Friday at Stanford University.