A CD has a radius of 12 cm for a playtime of 74 minutes because it is the playtime of Beethoven’s 9th symphony.
This opus had to fit on a single disc by the wish of either of Sony CEO‘s wife or conductor Herbert von Karajan… there are two versions of the story !
The details for the version with the CEO’s wife:
Sony’s CEO, Norio Oga, was conductor and cofounder of Sony with Akio Morita. The 9th symphony has different lengths depending on the conductor. 74 minutes is its length when the orchestra is conducted by Furtwangler.
Share this DYK with your friends (*)(*) If you are friendless, this my be the right thing to start gather some!
