Music Video History Research

1. History of Music
Videos
A2 Media Studies
Nina De Lima

2. Introduction
• A music video in short is a commercial video featuring a
performance of a popular song, often through a stylized
dramatization by actor/performers with lip-syncing and special
effects.
• These videos are produced with the purpose of music promotion or
simply for artistic reasons. It is crucial for artists in the music
industry to produce promotional material such as video clips so as
to it’s a way to popularize their work and gain access to the general
public.

3. Background
The first music video was allegedly produced in 1894 with the
song “The Little Lost Child” by Edward B. Marks and Joe Stern, a
little short animated video.
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4. Music videos
in MTV
MTV was launched in 1981, and this was an important era for
music, as it was the only television channel with 24hrs music
broadcast. ‘Music Killed The radio Star’ by the Buggles was the
first music video ever played on the MTV channel.

5. MTV’s first 5
songs broadcasted
Wikipedia

6. Music videos today
The music videos of today compared to the ones in the 80s have many
differences in production style; special effects was probably the main
change due to the use of new technologies, but there were also new
ideas, concepts of shot angles, aesthetic, for instance. Nowadays, the
typical video follows narratives related to heartbreaks and relationships,
where the artist is portrayed in a an often sexual and provocative way.
Despite the changes, music videos still work in the same way they were
intended to, which is to relate songs to audiences, keeping the latter
entertained and interacted.

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Timeline of
music videos in
the 20th century
Soundies were an
early version of the
music videos,
produced in New
York, Chicago and
Hollywood between
1940-1946
Scopitone is a type
of jukebox. It was a
forerunner of music
video. The first
Scopitones were
made is France 1960
Promos were
short filmed
clips in the
1960’s
1975 – The first
pop music video
released:
"Bohemian
Rhapsody" by
Queen
MTV is an
American network
based in New York
City that launched
on August 1st 1981
1981 – the US video
channel MTV
launched the “Video
Killed the Radio
Star” and
“Beginning an era of
24-hour-a-day”
music video
Micheal Jackson
releases a 14-minute
music video on
December 2nd 1983
1980’s – High-quality color
videotape recorders and
portable video cameras
coincided, enabling many pop
acts to produce promo videos
fast

8. Summary
 This presentation compiled the general history of music
videos, it’s background, along with some info about MTV.
 This research has led us to understand more about the
background of the beginning of music videos, and where
they all started. A timeline graph was also made to
present a clear idea of the development of the music
video industry.