Say,I saw the Skating Programs thread,and this question came to mind. We all know that Skating Programs have titles. By the name of the music a skater uses. But does anyone have any idea what program by song title was number one? As far as which skater in history had the first song for her/his program,and what the name of it was?

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FSWer

The first skater to use music in competition was apparently Lily Kronberger.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lily_Kronberger

The first skater to choreograph performances to music for shows was probably Jackson Haines.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jackson_Haines

Skaters may have skated to live music before that, but I don't think they would have been choreographed into "programs."

Remember that recording technology didn't really exist before the early 20th century, which is why Kronberger had to bring an actual small orchestra to the competition.

I don't know if one could find a record of what pieces of music they used.

Wow, I didn't know there was really a documented first person to skate to music in competition. How do you find this out? It sounds really interesting!

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Tidesong

I've read a lot of old skating books (Ice-Skating: A History by Nigel Brown mentioned Kronberger bringing musical accompaniment to competition) and back issues of Skating magazine.

I do wish Ice-Skating: A history didn't remind me so much of Harry Potter! It's a fantastic resource and I do commend it - it even has a picture of the skater I call Other Woman, who we compete against all the time.... you can imagine my reaction, reading all about the history of the sport, then I turn over and there she was..... she shrieked when I showed her! It's part of a chapter on the history of adult skating, and the picture is from the first ever Mountain Cup, with Barbara Standke and Rhea Schwartz also shown.

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Mrs Redboots
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