The 1900’s
1912
Italian Futurist Luigi Russolo publishes the Futurist Manifesto, which proposes the composition of music based entirely on the use of sound sources from the environment.
Electronic composer and innovator John Cage is born in LA.
1913
Russolo builds noise makers and hosts a concert of noise music. The instruments include 3 buzzers, 2 bursters, 1 thunderer, 1 shriller, 1 shatterer and 1 snorter.

1915
Cabaret Voltaire opens in Zurich and Dadaism is born. With a passion for technology, the Dadaists create music based on the sounds of the new industrial machines.

1916
Composer Erik Satie’s ‘Parade’ is a collaboration with Cocteau, Picasso and Serge Diaghilev that employs a battery of sirens, car horns, typewriters, guns. The public are outraged by the performance.

The 1920’s
1920
Dadaist Stephen Wolpe uses 8 gramophones playing at different speeds.

1923
Dadaist Kurt Schwitters sound poetry piece ‘Ursonate’ is a random collage of ambience and found sound sources.

1926
Computer pioneer Max Matthews is born in Nebraska.

1928
Karlheinz Stockhausen is born near Cologne.

1929

Akai is founded in Japan by electronic engineer Masukichi Akai who begins producing radio components from a shed at his family home, helped only by members of his immediate family.

The 1930’s
1931
Edgard Varese’s ‘Ionisation’ is a 37 piece showcase for 13 percussionists.

1933
James Brown is born in South Carolina.

1935
Invention of the first tape recorder the Magnetophon.
Minimalist composer Terry Riley is born in California.