Category Archives: Resources

by | May 24, 2014 · 1:00 am

The Leonard Bernstein Collection

bernstein tanglewood august 1946

The Leonard Bernstein Collection is a free online resource comprising selections from The Library of Congress’s holdings related to the composer and conductor.

The collection’s more than 400,000 items—including music and literary manuscripts, correspondence, photographs, audio and video recordings, fan mail, and other types of materials—extensively document Bernstein’s extraordinary life and career, making available 85 photographs, 177 scripts from the Young People’s Concerts, 74 scripts from the Thursday Evening Previews, and over 1,100 pieces of correspondence, all browseable or accessible through the collection’s Finding Aid.

Above, Bernstein at the piano at a party at Tanglewood in August 1946 (photographer unknown); below, the opening of the first televised Young People’s Concert.

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by | May 10, 2014 · 1:00 am

My homeland Tennessee

tennessee

Perhaps more than any other state, Tennessee is associated with music. The state, its cities, natural features, and historical events have been the subject of thousands of popular songs written and performed in almost every style. The idea of Tennessee is so popular that it has inspired great songwriting and performances not only by native Tennesseans but by people from all over the world.

My homeland Tennessee: A research guide to songs about Tennessee preserves and presents historic documents and recordings that illuminate Tennessee as represented in blues, ragtime, rock’n’roll, rap, folk, country, jazz, rhythm and blues, and other styles. This open-access resource also includes a special section on the several official state songs of Tennessee.

Below, Tennessee’s own Dolly Parton.

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by | April 24, 2014 · 1:00 am

The Canterbury dictionary of hymnology

hymnology

An essential reference resource for scholars of global hymnody, with information on the hymns of many countries and languages and a strong emphasis on the historical as well as the contemporary, The Canterbury dictionary of hymnology contains over 4000 individual entries and more than 300 authors from over 30 countries writing on hymns of the Judaeo-Christian tradition—from the earliest years to those written today—along with articles on individual hymns, authors from many countries, hymnals, organizations, themes, and hymn tunes and their composers.

Covering a multitude of hymn traditions from all continents, regions, and denominations, the database is ecumenical and international, and is published online to facilitate regular additions, amendments, and corrections. Intended as a replacement for the Dictionary of hymnology produced by John Julian in 1892 (with a supplement in 1907), it will be of interest to literary scholars, musicians, church historians, and theologians, and will be a delight for those who love the hymn as an art form. Each day three articles are made available to the public for one day.

Below, an example of African American lined-out hymn singing.

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by | February 15, 2014 · 1:00 am

Bach’s temperament

harpsichord tuning

It is unanimously accepted that the term wohltemperiert in the title of Bach’s Das wohltemperierte Klavier refers to a tuning that makes it possible to compose and perform music without restriction in all twelve major and minor keys; however, there are still divergent opinions about the tuning that Bach preferred for his composition.

One view is that so-called equal temperament was assumed, in which the octave is divded into twelve equal half-tones (the tuning which came to be generally accepted over the course of the 19th century). Other scholars dispute this, but do not agree among themselves about how the nuances of the inequality in tuning are to be divided among the individual major and minor keys.

This according to Valuable nuances of tuning for part I of J.S. Bach’s “Das wohl temperirte Clavier” by Mark Lindley (Berlin: Staatliches Institut für Musikforschung Preußischer Kulturbesitz, 2011), which is an open-access multimedia resource for students and performers of Bach’s work.

Below, Kenneth Gilbert’s interpretation.

More posts about J.S. Bach are here.

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by | February 3, 2014 · 1:00 am

Johannes Tinctoris: Complete theoretical works

tinctoris

Johannes Tinctoris: Complete theoretical works presents a complete new edition of Tinctoris’s treatises, along with full English translations and multiple layers of commentary material, covering a wide range of technical, historical, and critical issues arising from both the texts themselves and the wider context of Tinctoris’s life and the musical environment of early Renaissance Europe.

Combining the highest levels of historical, textual, and critical scholarship with innovative technological presentation, this open-access edition explores new methods of relating text-based materials to the numerous, often complex, music examples that punctuate the treatises.

The project, which is based at Birmingham Conservatoire, is an outgrowth of the ongoing research of Ronald Woodley into the life and works of Tinctoris.

Above, a depiction of Tinctoris at his desk; below, the Kyrie from his Missa L’homme armé.

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by | January 25, 2014 · 1:00 am

Dimitri Mitropoulos (1896–1960)

 

Dimitri Mitropoulos (1896–1960) is a research portal on the Greek-born American conductor compiled by Ilias Chrissochoidis.

This open-access resource includes a biography and an appreciation; a list of his compositions; bibliographies of his correspondence and writings about him; lists of concerts, lectures, and exhibitions held in his honor; and numerous photographs of him and facsimiles of his manuscripts and editions.

Below, Mitropoulos’s Greek sonata, performed by Charis Dimaras.

Related article: Library of Greek musicology

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by | December 20, 2013 · 1:00 am

Handel reference database

handel monument

Handel reference database is the largest collection of documents on the composer’s life, career, and early reception. This open-access online resource is the ongoing work of Ilias Chrissochoidis.

Currently at 800,000 words, it has fully absorbed Deutsch’s documentary biography on Handel up to the year 1726 and aspires to incorporate every available document on Handel through his Commemoration Festival of 1784.

Aside from providing free, direct, and permanent access to records on the Enlightenment’s most influential composer, it seeks to highlight the role of public benefit scholarship in today’s academia. HRD welcomes and fully acknowledges contributions from researchers working on the long 18th century (especially on Continental European music and theater) as well as collaborations that can accelerate its growth and improve its functionality.

Above, the monument to Handel at Westminster Abbey, where the composer’s remains are buried.

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by | October 11, 2013 · 1:00 am

Slovak Early Music Database – Cantus Planus in Slovacia

slovak ms

Slovak Early Music Database – Cantus Planus in Slovacia was established in 2012 at the Ústav hudobnej vedy Slovenskej akadémie vied in collaboration with Hudobný fond/Music Fund Slovakia as a full-text English-language database of the notated manuscripts and fragmentary notated sources from the area of Slovakia dating from the late 11th to the early 16th century.

Directed by Eva Veselovská, the database allows free and universal access to a large number of music manuscripts kept at libraries and archives in Slovakia. It provides a number of search possibilities, including the archive (with RISM sigla), source, text incipit of a chant, feast, and genre searches. Manuscript fragments and selected codices with monophonic or polyphonic music are fully indexed.

To view digital images in high resolution, a free Slovak Early Music Database – Cantus Planus in Slovacia account must be established.

Below, an example from a Slovakian manuscript.

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by | October 7, 2013 · 1:00 am

Hildegard of Bingen

Museum - Hildegard von Bingen

In Hildegard of Bingen (Oxford bibliographies, 2013) Honey Meconi presents an annotated bibliography of over 130 of the most important publications for the study of the 12th-century composer’s works.

This resource is divided into separate sections for editions, essay collections, Ordo virtutum, performance practice, and so on. Significant publications of Hildegard’s nonmusical works are included as well.

Above, a detail from a stained glass piece that was once part of Rochuskapelle, just southeast of Bingen. below, the Oxford Camerata performs Hildegard’s Ave generosa.

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by | August 9, 2013 · 1:00 am

American cantorate

david koussevitsky

American cantorate presents all of the raw data of the 1984–86 NEH-funded project History of the American Cantorate, which was directed by Mark Slobin.

This free online resource includes over 100 listenable oral history interviews of cantors; a listenable 93-cantor core sample of sung selections of 8 liturgical texts, a first in Jewish music studies; questionnaire survey responses of hundreds of cantors and lay leaders; letters solicited from rabbis about working with cantors; research reports and data summaries commissioned for the project; and ongoing additions of archival documentation.

David Koussevitsky is one of the cantors featured in the study. A related video is here.

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