Academic Music Librarians, Music, College Term Papers.com


		Data Bases
		• Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism?

		Links
		• Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com

		Free Essays
		• Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • My Term Papers • Get Free Essays • Essay World • Planet Papers

Search Lots of Essays

Back to Subjects - Music

Academic Music Librarians

Academic Music Librarians An academic music librarian is a woman or man, just over 49 years old, well educated, working in an academic or conservatory library. This presents a snapshot of those working in the field of academic music librarianship. More specifically, the academic music librarian is a woman 10% more of the time than she is a man. The academic music librarian is approximately 49 years of age with two thirds of academic music librarians falling between the ages of 37 and 61 (Lesniaski 1999, 6). The overwhelming majority of academic music librarians, 99%, have college degrees with a fairly wide variety of actual majors. Of these, 46% have a BA in music and 34% have a BM in music. Of those who earned a BA, most majored in musicology. The distribution of those who earned a BM looks a little different with instrumental performance the dominant major, followed by musicology. 97% also have at least one graduate degree with the large majority, 63%, having either an MA in music or an MM. Here again, the dominant major is musicology. Most of those with an MM are also musicology majors. A further 20% have a doctorate degree in music, 86% of those in musicology (Summary of Data from MLA Survey, 2-5). 94% of academic music librarians also have an MLS. 69% received degrees from ALA accredited institutions, 4% from non-accredited institutions. 13% have a specialization in music librarianship (Summary of Data from MLA Survey, 6-7). By definition, academic music librarians are employed at academic libraries serving schools of music. Some of the librarians serve in conservatory libraries, which are more specialized. 48% work in institutions termed research libraries. Looking at music librarians as a whole leaves 13% employed at public libraries, 12% employed at other libraries, 7% as educators and 3% in the publishing industry (Lesniaski 1999, 8-9). Although the preceding paragraphs look, at first glance, to be a list of numbers, they provide a detailed picture of the academic music librarian and therefore a detailed picture of what their information-seeking behaviors and needs are. These librarians have spent many years using libraries in their educational pursuits. This is especially evident when one takes into account the fact that most of them majored in musicology, an academic degree. They are at work daily in institutions of higher learning. The academic music librarian wears many hats. She is a reference librarian, and an administrator; she is responsible for collection development, selection of materials, cataloging of materials, processing of materials and circulation of materials. She is also providing bibliographic instruction or user education. In addition, she may be doing her own research. In academic music libraries, excepting the largest of these, the librarian does most of the tasks listed above herself. (Coral 1990, 19) As the reference librarian, she answers questions from students, faculty and the public. As an administrator, she often supervises students and paraprofessionals working in the library. Under this function, she also does “marketing” for the library and may be responsible for fundraising. She selects the materials for the collection and is responsible for it’s maintenance. This includes weeding the collection and replacing or repairing materials as the need arises. She often catalogs the materials. Due to the nature of the materials, much may be required to get them ready to be put on the shelf in terms of packaging (Bryant 1985, 27). This is also her job. If she is not actually checking the materials out to patrons, she is responsible for the oversight of this function. This usually includes maintaining class reserves for faculty. She will usually be expected to provide user education to the students of the school and to faculty as well (Troutman 2000, 58). If this isn’t enough, she will also be expected to continue her studies and to perform research with publication as the goal (Lasocki 2000, 888). The academic music librarian as reference librarian will make use of a vast array of sources to answer the volley of questions that come her way (Lasocki 2000, 882). Foremost of these sources is The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, edited by Stanley Sadie, now in its second edition and readily available by subscription online. This can be considered the primary source for most basic reference questions. Contained within are articles about composers, musical forms and styles, seminal works, and historical eras in music. The articles about composers contain biographical information, lists of works, and historical perspectives. (Bryant 1985, 77) A musical dictionary is imperative for definitions of terms and the Harvard Dictionary of Music in its 2nd edition, revised and expanded by Willi Apel, fits the bill. (Bryant 1985, 71). In the area of reference, more detailed or complex questions may be answered using a variety of resources such as song indexes, complete works of individual composers, specialized dictionaries (such as The Dictionary of Opera and Song Themes, Including Cantatas, Oratorios, Lieder and Art Songs by Harold Barlow and Sam Morgenstern) (Bryant 1985, 87), bibliographies, catalogs, discographies and periodicals (Bryant 1985, 93-99). Academic music librarians responsible for collection development (selections and acquisitions) have at their disposal a variety of sources to assist them with these tasks. First of these are the leaflets and catalogs of music publishers (Bryant 1985, 17). Notes, the Journal of the Music Library Association, is valuable for its extensive reviews of both print and sound items written by music librarians and intended for their colleagues. Other periodicals such as Music Review and Music and Letters are sources for print materials reviews. Gramophone, Fanfare, High Fidelity and Musical America, and Hi-Fi News and Record Review provide reviews for assistance in choosing sound recordings (Bryant1985 , 332-337). Indeed, Mr. Bryant’s work itself is an excellent source for advice on building music library collections. As well, academic music librarians inhabit a space on the Internet in the form of the MLA-L listserv where they share ideas of all sorts, including asking advice in the area of collection development. Academic music librarians who work as catalogers make use of a number of sources to accomplish this difficult and necessary task. Documents supporting standardized cataloging rules like AACR2 are invaluable to the cataloger of music. The Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) allows for cooperative cataloging of materials and has been the single most important advance in the area of cataloging of both music and non-music materials. Research Libraries Group (RLG) provides a similar function. (Papakhian, 19-20) The Music Cataloging Bulletin is another invaluable tool for the music cataloger. Here again, music librarians are an active online community sharing thoughts about the more difficult questions of cataloging via, chiefly, MLA-L as well as other listservs. Online sources have become essential tools for the music cataloger. The OCLC homepage (www.oclc.org) and the USMARC homepage (http://lcweb.loc.gov/marc/) are chief among these online resources. There are other online sources such as the Online Audio Visual Catalogers (OLAC) web page (http://ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/units/cts/olac/) which are also vital (Sibley Music Library Technical Services 2001). Academic music librarians as instructors are quite common. This service provided to the schools and conservatories served by music libraries is expected and indeed necessary for the students and faculty. (Troutman 2000, 58-60). To assist them as well as their students, the academic music librarian will find the Directory of Music User Guides for Libraries available at http://www.library.yale.edu/~segglstn/mugdir/ extremely helpful (Bibliographic Instruction Subcommittee, Music Library Association). Bibliography: Works Cited Basart, Ann. “Reference Lacunae: Results of an Informal Survey of What Music Librarians Want.” in Foundations in Music Bibliography, ed. Richard Green, 365-384. New York: Haworth Press, Inc., 1993. Bibliographic Instruction Subcommittee, Music Library Association. Directory of Music Users Guides for Libraries . (accessed 25 September, 2001) Bryant, E.T. Music Librarianship: a Practical Guide, with the assistance of Guy A. Marco, with a foreword by Ruth Watanabe, 2nd ed. Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1985 Coral, Lenore. “Music Librarianship.” in Career in Music Librarianship: Perspectives from the Field, compiled by Carol Tatian, 1-31. Music Library Association Technical Reports, ed. Richard P. Smiraglia, no. 18. Canton, MA: Music Library Association, 1990. Lasocki, David. “Music Reference as a Calling,” Notes: Quarterly Journal of the Music Library Association 56 Issue 4 (June 2000): 879-894. Lesniaski, David, chair, Tim Cherubini, et al. “A Profile of the Music Library Association Membership: Report of the Working Group Surveying Music Library Personnel Characteristics.” July 1999; rev. January 2000. (accessed 13 September, 2001). Marley, Judith L. “Bibliographic and User Instruction Within Music Libraries: An Overview of Teaching Methodologies,” Music Reference Services Quarterly, Vol. 6(3) (1998): 33-44. Morrow, Jean. “Education for Music Librarianship,” Notes: Quarterly Journal of the Music Library Association, 56 Issue 3 (March 2000): 655-662. Music Library Association. MLA-L Archives. (accessed 1 October, 2001). Papakhian, A. Ralph. “Cataloging.” in Music Librarianship at the Turn of the Century ed. Richard Griscom, 19-28. Music Library Association Technical Reports, No. 27. Lanham, Maryland: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2000. Sibley Music Library Technical Services. . (accessed 1 October, 2001). Summary of Data from MLA Survey. http://www.music.indiana.edu/tech_s/mla/personm/mladatasummaryfornotes.htm. (accessed 13 September, 2001. Tice, Beth. “Two Hats, One Heart: Confessions of a Split Position Librarian,” Technicalities, Volume 18 Issue 7 (July/August 1998): 4-6. Troutman, Leslie. “User Education.” in Music Librarianship at the Turn of the Century ed. Richard Griscom, 58-65. Music Library Association Technical Reports, No. 27. Lanham, Maryland: The Scarecrow Press, Inc., 2000.

Word Count: 1285