Going the Way of the Victrola
The same expanding technology that improves the capabilities of the PC also shrinks the size of the old recording hardware. Singers can use tiny microphones made of lightweight plastic. The sound quality will get better and you'll soon be able to buy them wherever batteries or blank cassettes are available. The daunting multitrack tasks that once could only be accomplished in the recording studio are now possible at home using innovative music software. Computerized mixing boards can already do more than the giant, complicated boards still found in most recording studios. The art of sequencing and sampling might well become a substitute for musical instruments, requiring a new sort of virtuosity.

Still in an embryonic stage, the making of music on the PC should eventually produce work rivaling that made by today's recording artists and composers — even surpassing them. The use of the PC isn't just a hobby anymore. The musical geniuses of tomorrow won't even have to leave their homes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/02/11/technology/11WAGE.html?pagewanted=all