Timeline of Music in The United States To 1819 - 1787

1787

• John Aitken becomes the first American publisher of strictly music, and the first to publish secular sheet music in the United States. Most of the music is composed or arranged by Alexander Reinagle. Aitken engraves Reinagle's A Selection of the Most Favorite Scots-Irish Tunes, which is the first use of punching tools to engrave music in the country.
• Johannes Herbst, a Moravian bishop and hymn writer, begins collecting music manuscripts, creating a massive archive that will not be made available until 1977.