In 1922, Compton Mackenzie, then living on a Channel Island, bought a gramophone and, within two months, 1200 discs at the cost of £400 (more than £19,000 in today’s money). A year later he founded a magazine devoted to discussing the subject: that was, and is, Gramophone (though then in possession of the definite article). 

On the opening page of the first issue he wrote, ‘Our policy will be to encourage the recording companies to build up for generations to come a great library of good music.’  Ninety years on, it is only right to salute the labels on having done just that – though throughout, we have been true to our stated aim to be ‘an organ of candid opinion’ about the very recordings they made. This history was wonderfully documented in a 1998 book by former editor and owner Anthony Pollard, Gramophone: The First 75 Years; and it was a very great joy to dine last month with him – together with his son (and another former editor) Christopher, our new owners, and editor-in-chief James Jolly – and share stories which well illustrate both how much has changed, though also how much hasn’t, and shouldn’t. 

Indeed, as we embark on a new era in Gramophone’s history under the ownership of the Mark Allen Group – only the fourth owners the magazine has had – it seems an important time to re-emphasise the values the magazine stands for, and always has.

Consequently, some alterations have been made. You will find more reviews of a greater length, and the reviews themselves spread more expansively throughout the whole magazine. More pages are being devoted to reissues, and a new feature discusses a recording widely held to be a catalogue benchmark. There are of course interviews and features that help add context to new releases, but recording is at the root of everything we publish. We’ve distilled all this into the ‘mission statement’ which reads as follows:

'Gramophone, which has been serving the classical music world since 1923, is first and foremost a monthly review magazine, delivered today in both print and digital formats. It boasts an eminent and knowledgeable panel of experts, which reviews the full range of classical music recordings. Its reviews are completely independent. In addition to reviews, its interviews and features help readers to explore in greater depth the recordings that the magazine covers, as well as offer insight into the work of composers and performers. It is the magazine for the classical record collector, as well as for the enthusiast starting a voyage of discovery.'

We really hope it encapsulates the sort of magazine you want to read every month. 

All of this is, we believe, entirely in keeping with our heritage, but we’d be neglecting that heritage if we didn’t also keep firmly in step with progress – just as Mackenzie was doing when he shipped that library of 78s out to Herm – and ensure online music and live streaming are an important part of our coverage. It’s become so normal to find the most obscure repertoire online and then be listening to it in mere moments, that we’ve perhaps come to take it for granted. (In our haste to listen to that sought-after recording, we also perhaps take for granted that someone, somehow, had to pay for it to be made in the first place.) We shouldn’t forget – and indeed should celebrate – what a remarkable era of recorded music technology we are witnessing; an era in which quantity and quality go hand in hand to the benefit of us all.

But having said that, I don’t feel it’s anywhere near as big a leap as the astonishing shift in musical history which enabled Mackenzie to listen to music on a remote island in the first place; something which Gramophone, the magazine for recorded classical music, has never taken for granted, and never will. 

martin.cullingford@markallengroup.com