These 10 inventions changed music forever: From medieval monks to Charli XCX – here’s how

It’s becoming harder to tell the difference between music created today and music from the early 2000s. Some believe musical innovation has slowed down in recent decades, leading to a more uniform, global sound. However, music has always been closely linked to advancements in technology.

For the past thousand years, new inventions have constantly changed how music is created, supported, shared, played, and listened to. Despite the common perception of classical music as a traditional and unchanging art form, that’s not entirely true. A new series on BBC Radio 3, called Key Changes, reveals the important moments of innovation that have shaped music over the last millennium. Here, the series presenter, Gillian Moore, highlights ten of these major turning points.

1) The musical stave

Around the year 1025, Guido of Arezzo, an Italian monk, faced a challenge: teaching other monks to sing religious chants correctly. The existing musical notation was unclear and complicated. It was so difficult to understand that if monks in England wanted to learn a new chant from Rome, someone had to travel there to teach it directly.

Moore explains that there’s a pivotal moment where he draws four lines – a musical stave – and then fills it with notes. He even gives those notes names – ‘ut, re, mi’ – so the monks could easily memorize and read music. This was a revolutionary change, forming the foundation for how music has been written and shared for the past thousand years. Because of this invention, we can still enjoy music today, from early composers like Hildegard of Bingen to modern artists like Hans Zimmer.

2) The Petrucci printing press

Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of the movable-type printing press in 1440 transformed publishing, significantly reducing both the cost and time needed to create printed works. However, for music, the major breakthrough came in 1501, with Ottaviano Petrucci, who was working in a workshop in Venice.

As a music fan, it’s amazing to learn about how music was first made available to more people! Apparently, before the 1500s, all music was painstakingly copied by hand – imagine how long that took! But then this guy, Petrucci, invented a printing press that could handle both the notes and the little dots that show rhythm. It meant music could finally be printed and shared much more easily, instead of being limited to what a few scribes and monks could write out. It was a total game-changer!

Petrucci revolutionized music publishing that year by using movable type to print polyphonic music – and later, popular songs. This created a thriving market for sheet music, eventually paving the way for pieces like Scott Joplin’s Maple Leaf Rag. While it’s debated whether the 1899 rag sold a million copies, it was incredibly popular and had a significant impact on the development of early jazz in America.

3) Equal temperament

I’ve always been captivated by how music achieves that perfect, in-tune sound. It’s a surprisingly complex problem that has intrigued thinkers for centuries! Traditionally, music was built around the natural way strings vibrate, creating a beautiful series of notes. But this meant some musical keys sounded fantastic, while others just didn’t quite work. That’s why I was so impressed to learn about Zhu Zaiyu, a Chinese prince from the 1500s, who figured out a way to divide the musical scale into twelve equal parts – what we now call equal temperament. It solved the problem beautifully!

This development allowed musicians to seamlessly transition between different musical keys. As Moore explains, this fundamentally changed the sound of music. A prime example is Johann Sebastian Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, which is written in all 24 major and minor keys. Lady Gaga actually uses a complete musical theme from Bach’s work at the beginning of her song “Bad Romance.” Before equal temperament, this would have sounded awful – everything would have been noticeably out of tune.

4) The railway

According to Moore, when composers from places like Flanders and France moved to Italy during the Renaissance, or when Haydn and Mozart travelled to London to find work, these weren’t just trips – they were significant, challenging experiences that greatly impacted their lives.

The arrival of railways revolutionized travel for musicians, making it easier than ever to tour Europe. As music historian Moore explains, this was a pivotal moment. For example, the premiere of Mendelssohn’s Elijah in Birmingham in 1846 featured 400 performers, many of whom traveled from London on a dedicated steam train.

I’ve seen how much touring has changed! It used to be all about planes and buses, but now artists are increasingly looking at trains as a way to travel – it’s great to see them thinking about reducing their impact on the environment. It feels like a real shift back to a more sustainable way of getting around.

5) The piston valve

Imagine the famous trumpet solo at the end of the Beatles’ song, Penny Lane, or the beautiful French horn part in Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony. Also, think of the complex solos often played on cornets in brass bands. None of these would have been possible before the early 1800s, before the invention of the piston valve for brass instruments.

Early brass instruments like horns and trumpets were limited in the notes they could play, so their music often sounded forceful and was used for loud sections, such as in a Haydn symphony, explains Moore. However, with the addition of piston valves, these instruments gained the ability to play beautiful and intricate melodies, making the higher brass section sound almost as expressive as a human voice. Brass bands became incredibly popular in 19th-century Britain, drawing musicians from factories, mines, and mills, and they are experiencing a renewed surge in popularity today.

6) The metronome

In 1814, Dietrich Nikolaus Winkel created the first metronome in Amsterdam. This device allowed composers to precisely indicate how fast a piece of music should be played, using a measurement we now know as beats per minute (BPM). A few years later, Johann Maelzel improved on Winkel’s design, patenting a wind-up, mechanical metronome that ticked with each beat.

I find it fascinating that Beethoven was one of the first musicians to really embrace the metronome! He actually revisited all his symphonies and added markings to show exactly how fast he intended each part to be played. Some people at the time didn’t appreciate that level of control, feeling it was too rigid, but honestly, the concept of measuring music in beats per minute is fundamental to so much of the music we listen to today. It’s amazing to think he was ahead of his time!

7) The upright piano

Originally, pianos were expensive, handmade instruments enjoyed by the wealthy and skilled musicians. However, the Industrial Revolution led to the creation of more affordable upright pianos, making them a popular addition to homes across Britain during the 1800s and 1900s.

In the past, composers such as Brahms created piano arrangements of their larger orchestral pieces, allowing people to enjoy and play the music in their homes. According to music expert Moore, upright pianos were accessible to many, which greatly increased both music participation and the ability to read music. Moore notes that upright pianos were common even in modest homes – he himself grew up with one in a 1960s apartment, and relatives in Glasgow had them too. It’s likely many famous musicians, like Paul McCartney and Elton John (who composed many early songs on an upright), also learned and practiced on these pianos.

While upright pianos aren’t as common in homes anymore, you’ll now find them popping up in public places like train stations and parks all over the world.

8) The phonograph

Today, we easily take sound recordings for granted. But when Thomas Edison first successfully recorded sound – a children’s nursery rhyme called “Mary Had a Little Lamb” – he was completely surprised. It must have been shocking to hear his own voice played back to him, made possible by his 1877 invention: a metal cylinder covered in tinfoil.

The phonograph, as its inventor called it, was the beginning of today’s recording industry, giving musicians a way to earn money from their work. Selling these recordings quickly became a major industry. It also helped kickstart the English Folk Revival in the early 1900s, with figures like Vaughan Williams, Holst, and Maud Karpeles traveling the country to record traditional music on wax cylinders. This effort preserved musical traditions that were at risk of being lost due to industrialization and increasing globalization, according to Moore.

9) Electronic instruments

Genres like drum and bass, house, techno, trance, hip-hop, and even hyperpop likely wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for two little-known electronic instruments, which were originally embraced by classical composers.

The Theremin, invented in 1920 by Russian scientist Léon Theremin, was soon followed by the Ondes Martenot in 1928, created by French inventor Maurice Martenot. As Moore explains, the magnetic tape recorder, developed right before World War II and improved afterward, was also crucial. It wasn’t just for recording; it allowed musicians to alter and experiment with sounds – essentially, it enabled early forms of sampling.

French musicians were among the first to play with manipulating recorded sounds – things like reversing them or changing their pitch. This experimentation, also seen in the work of bands like The Beatles, paved the way for today’s genres like hyperpop and artists like Charli XCX. Without these early innovators, those sounds might not exist as we know them.

10) The World Wide Web

In 1993, Tim Berners-Lee made his World Wide Web software freely available to everyone, and he couldn’t have predicted how dramatically it would change music. His invention allowed for instant information sharing worldwide, completely transforming how we listen to music.

Even a thousand years after Guido of Arezzo developed the first system for writing down music, we’re still finding new ways to share it, says Moore. Tim Berners-Lee’s invention of the World Wide Web led to the internet culture we have today, which relies heavily on streaming and smartphones. According to Moore, it’s now incredibly easy to personalize your musical experience. People are less focused on specific genres and more on how music makes them feel – whether they want to relax, get energized, or motivate themselves during a workout.

Music is everywhere, and according to Moore, it might soon be inside us – possibly even implanted in our cheekbones. Whether she’s serious or not is up to you to decide.

Authors

Rebecca Franks

2026-04-01 12:06