Why could musicians not edit mistakes on acetate-disc recordings?

In the context of early music and sound recording, it was extremely difficult to edit acetate or wax discs because the recording process was physical and permanent. Unlike later technologies that allowed for the manipulation of sound, these discs required the sound to be cut directly into the medium at the time of the performance.1

Because the audio was physically etched into the surface of the disc, there was no practical way to "cut and paste" or splice segments together as one could later do with magnetic tape or film. If a mistake occurred during the recording, the entire take was typically ruined, necessitating a complete re-recording of the performance. This limitation remained a significant challenge for producers until the advent of magnetic recording and other advancements in the late 1940s, which finally provided the ability to add, edit, and mix sound separately from the initial recording session.12