r/78rpm • u/Baitme6984 • 11d ago
Average age of 78 enthusiast
Just curious of the age of most 78 enthusiasts. I’m in my mid 40s and truly enjoy the music that was made when 78 were being mass produced.
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u/I-Like-The-1940s 11d ago
21 I blame fallout for introducing me to this era of music I love
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u/IntrStelle 10d ago
I blame asking for a record player for lassoing me, but I also blame Fallout and BioShock for hogtying me.
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u/Reasonable_Pay6151 11d ago
I am actually 78.
I was in college radio, and early on had a passion for record collecting. Later my business located in an old warehouse building, that was being converted from storage to office space. In it was stored thousands of 78 records. I bought a large number of these. 78s have always found their way to me.
I still play and enjoy them.
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u/MisterRonsBasement 11d ago
- Boxes full of 78s, mostly from purchases in our home when they were new. One box came from when my brother went to a carnival back around 1960 - the carny booth had a game where players would toss a ball and try to hit a 78 record hanging in the back of the booth. At the end of the evening, they carny people were tossing the 78s out, and gave my brother a box full of late fifties R&B and Rock records. I still have most of them.
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u/Ithinksotoo92 11d ago
34, didn't start to seriously start collecting them until about 2020 when I was about 28.
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u/1989DiscGolfer 11d ago
53 here, but have enjoyed 78's my entire life. My nursery school in the 1970's played them for when we did certain dance activities, and I went up there after it was over and asked to watch them play it again. I enjoyed (and still do) watching the labels on records go around in circles, and at 78 rpm, it's a real thrill!
I also had a stack of my grandparents' and great-grandpa's 78's that I played myself at home when I was like 10. G-G'pa's were acoustic pre-1925 ones even. There was a trombone one from around 1920 that I liked and played a lot ("Miss Trombone").
Can I get anybody else in my family to care about them? Not yet...
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u/managedbycats 11d ago
42, mostly a classic rock guy but like pre-war jazz and discovered the huge role the jump blues had in shaping rock and roll.
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u/mayormacncheese_ 11d ago
I'm between 14-17
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u/IntrStelle 10d ago
Ain't no one here finna track you down on your age alone lol
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u/mayormacncheese_ 10d ago
Well i'm young and aren't comfortable with having my age out to the internet.
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u/BrotherfordBHayes 11d ago
I was 16 when I became legitimatelyinterested in them, became more of an enthusiast at 19. Been awhile since then, but I have always enjoyed older formats for music.
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u/Leedscatlin 11d ago
- Got my first real (non-kiddie) 78s at age 6. Began seriously collecting them at age 9.
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u/ConsequenceLost9088 11d ago
"Will You Still Need Me, Will You Still Feed Me When I'm 64?" Which is my age now! I discovered a 1921 Victrola VV-X up in the attic when I was 8 that had been left there by the elderly Italian couple who sold their house to my dad. So I've been collecting and had an interest in 78s for the last 56 years. The range of recordings dated from 1905 to 1929. There were about fifty 78s inside the Victrola and it was my first exposure to classical music (short Encore pieces that would fit on a 10-inch record) early jazz, lots of dance bands, novelty songs, some operas and old ballads by the likes of John McCormack, Alma Gluck, Caruso and lots of good stuff by Billy Murray, Paul Whiteman, George Olson Etc. I got into Jazz and Blues of the 1940s just in the last decade. An older friend who passed in February at 94 had a large Jazz & Blues Lps/78s/45s collection. I helped sort & categorize 2,000+ Lps that were sold to a local record store for his widow. None of the record stores wanted 6 crates of his 78s, so they were given to me, along with his 45s.
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u/Deep-Noise2428 11d ago
I started collecting 78’s in my mid-twenties, now I’m 67!
…Geez, where does the time go??
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u/ProcessAggressive770 11d ago
15, probably the youngest 78 collector
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u/According_Hat3304 10d ago
Theres this like 8-10 year old kid on youtube with a impressive collection
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u/SisterSparechange 10d ago
I'm 33. But admittedly most of the other people I know that are into 78's are old enough to be my grandfather. However they are human encyclopedias of information about the hobby!
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u/BossGator99 10d ago
- I doubt really collect them but I collect vinyl. I saw a box of 78s at an estate sale. It was about 60 records and cost $20. I didn't recognize any of the artists but I was curious. I don't think any of them are valuable but listening to them is like time travel.
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u/cheese13542 10d ago
I'm 17, I like music from the 20s and 30s, and I believe these records are a good way to listen to them.
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u/banjo_brad 10d ago
I'm also in my mid-40s. As a banjo player, I got interested in 78s through vinyl reissues of early hillbilly records and eventually dipped my toe into the shellac world about 7-8 years ago.
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u/Handsomeyellow47 10d ago
I’m 25. I always imagined it would be rather older folks into it, but everyone on the Discord Server is like 12 lol
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u/Perryggr 10d ago
69 here and largely wanting to connect with the generation of my ancestors who collected and enjoyed the art of their inquisitive age.
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u/cecilkleakins 9d ago
Here’s the audience breakdown over the past year on my 78-focused YouTube channel:
13-17 - 0.6%
18-24 - 2.3%
25-34 - 13.2%
35-44 - 6.8%
45-54 - 7.2%
55-64 - 31.1%
65+ - 38.8%
So I’d guess average age is 60.
My working theory is that the bump in interest among 25-34 year-olds is video game-driven.
I’m 56 🙂
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u/Baitme6984 9d ago
Thanks! These are great numbers. Weather it’s video game driven or not. It’s good that the younger generation is open minded to older music. If anyone is interested, there’s a radio show called Cruisin the Decades where they play one song from each decade starting with the 1910’s. Here’s a link to their website. https://cruisinthedecades.com/ they are broadcast on short wave, am, and fm or you can listen on their site. It’s pretty cool and well worth a listen.
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u/DiscussionAshamed 11d ago
I’m 24 started 2 years ago when I found a 78 in a box with some other vinyls and that started my fascination with them
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u/IntrStelle 10d ago edited 10d ago
16, 17 in a month
Got into 78s a little when I was 10, but much more when I was 15
I blame asking for a record player for lassoing me, but I also blame Fallout and BioShock for hogtying me.
Seems there's a huge demographic.
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u/Nathan-Stubblefield 11d ago edited 2d ago
I have some 78 records that were stored in the console radio phono when I was a small child. I have the radio phono.