And she shall have music wherever she goes: gendered consumerism in the early recording industry

Abstract

Women played a central role in late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century household music. As phonographs and gramophones entered domestic settings, women became curators of both machines and musical content. Responsible for household management and aesthetic choices, they selected devices and repertoires and shaped listening environments. Advertising positioned sound technologies, marketed primarily to women, as necessities and fashionable accessories. Drawing on advertisements and contemporary sources from the 1890s to 1930, the article argues that women, as consumers and music curators, decisively shaped early listening practices and advanced the cultural legitimacy of recorded music in the private sphere.