June 21, 1948, is cited as the date that Columbia Records committed to the 33 1/3 RPM Long Playing record, which would soon replace the 78 RPM format and become the standard for the music industry for the next 50 years. The change was motivated in part by the desire of Columbia's president, Ted Wallerstein, to hear an entire movement of a symphony on one side of an album.
Some of the early LPs featured artists such as Eugene Ormandy and the Philadelphia Orchestra, and Bruno Walter and the New York Philharmonic. But Columbia's most popular release was the first pop album in the new format - the LP reissue of The Voice of Frank Sinatra, originally recorded in 1946.
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