Collection Description Focus Workshop 4 (8 November 2002) 1 Cecilia Towards a Collection Level...

Collection Description Focus Workshop 4 (8 November 2002)

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Cecilia

Towards a Collection Level Description of the Music Holdings

of the UK and Ireland


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Cecilia – Background and History

• Led by the UK and Ireland Branch of the International Association of Music Libraries - IAML(UK & Irl)

• Developed from the MILDRED project (Music In Libraries, Directory and REsource Discovery)– Barbara Penney, ‘Music in British Libraries’ (4th ed. 1991)

• Funded by BLCPP, RSLP, Re:Source and the Music Libraries Trust

• Enlarged from a library based resource to a cross-domain, cross-sectoral project

• Cecilia began work in September 2001


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Cecilia – Objectives

• Cecilia is primarily a resource discovery tool• Cecilia aims to build a high level map of the

music materials located in collections held by libraries, archives and museums in the UK and Ireland– Public, Academic, National, Special, Private

• Cecilia aims to provide the entry point for existing online music resource discovery projects (e.g. Ensemble, Music Libraries Online, Encore)


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Cecilia – The National Music Resource• All collections of materials concerned with

music• All music materials held as part of general

collections• The aggregate of individual institutional

collections• Distributed between many different

organisations• Distributed across domains• Exists in many different formats


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Cecilia – Scope and Context• Between 650 and 700 institutions identified as potential

contributors of collection descriptions– Organisations dedicated to music (e.g. conservatoires,

university departments, museums of musical instruments, departments of national and larger public and academic libraries and archives, music information centres, private collections)

– General libraries, museums and archives with smaller music collections

– Organisations with music materials held as part of broad general collections


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Cecilia – Materials 1

• Formats of materials include– Manuscript and printed music– Sound recordings (from wax cylinders to minidiscs)– Audio visual materials (film, video, DVD, CD-ROM)– Private papers, diaries, letters– Corporate and business records– Production and technical records– Images (paintings, drawings, sculpture, photographs, slides,

prints, lithographs)– Books, newspapers, pamphlets, periodicals


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Cecilia – Materials 2

• Formats of materials include– Theses and other academic exercises– Playscripts and libretti– Concert programmes– Press cuttings– Musical instruments– Objects (set designs and models, costumes)– Concert ephemera (tickets, posters, handbills,

promotional literature)– Online resources


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Cecilia – Method 1

• Cecilia is committed to using the RSLP Collection Level Description Schema

• Cecilia developed a version of the schema to take account of the range and diversity of music materials and the wide variety of holding organisations.

• A database was built in MS AccessXP• The Cecilia website (www.cecilia-uk.org) was

launched, with online institution and collection record forms for data input.

http://www.cecilia-uk.org/


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Cecilia – Method 2

• Details of the project and invitations to contribute were sent to ca. 700 organisations.

• Data from the original MILDRED library survey was used to pilot test the database

• The Cecilia database will be hosted by the Performing Arts Data Service (www.pads.ahds.ac.uk/)

http://www.pads.ahds.ac.uk/


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CLD for Music 1

• Cecilia is asking a large number of organisations to supply data free of charge

• Libraries archives and museums record their collection data in different ways

• The structure of the Collection Level Description needed to be as simple and flexible as possible


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CLD for Music 2

• Defining the collection– Librarians, archivists and curators must decide what

constitutes a collection – In an online environment it is not necessary to restrict CLDs

to items of one type or objects stored or displayed together– Practical/pragmatic considerations

• How much time can I give to this project?• Can I expand or extend my contribution at a later stage?

– No rigid definition was imposed – general guidelines only

• It is inevitable that the level of detail will vary


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CLD for Music 3

• Issues include:– Names

• How do you spell Tchaikovsky (Chaykovski??)• Or Rachmaninoff (Rachmaninov,

Rakhmaninov??)• Or Skryabin (Scriabin, Scriabine??)

• Cecilia uses The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2nd ed., 2001) as the name authority file


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CLD for Music 4

• Issues include:– Subject headings / keywords

• Impractical to insist that a large number of diverse institutions conform to a single scheme

• Contributors asked to supply simple keywords, singly or in combination

• We are editing the keywords for consistency, and building a non-heirarchical concordance

• Searchers will be able to browse lists of keywords


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Cecilia - Example• Institution name: The Britten-Pears Library• Collection title: Sources for Britten's compositions• Collection description: The collection includes: Britten's

manuscripts, comprising the majority of works written from early boyhood until his death; draft libretti of Britten operas by Eric Crozier, Ronald Duncan, E. M. Foster, Myfanwy Piper and William Plomer; annotated text sources for Britten's vocal works; printers' copies, proofs and early editions of Britten's works; original stage and costume designs for several of Britten's operas. This collection is predominantly used by researchers (from undergraduate level upwards), performers and designers/producers.

• Keywords: Composers; England; Twentieth century; Opera; Librettists; Designers


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Cecilia – Example (continued)• Personal / corporate names: Britten, Benjamin; Pears, Peter;

Piper, Myfanwy; Crozier, Eric; Duncan, Ronald; Plomer, William; Forster, E. M.; Piper, John; Richards, Ceri

• Place names: Lowestoft; Snape; Aldeburgh; Long Island; New York; Wolfsgarten; Venice; Horham

• Dates associated with collection: 1919-1976• Formats: Manuscript music; Printed music; Paintings; Drawings;

Books; Microforms• Languages of materials: English; Latin; French; German; Italian;

Russian• Principal_collectors: Britten, Benjamin; Pears, Peter


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Cecilia – Example (continued)

• Catalogue / finding_aids: http://www.britten-pears.co.uk/Catalogue.htm; other finding-aids available onsite

• Associated publications: Benjamin Britten: A Catalogue of the Published Works, compiled and edited by Paul Banks (Aldeburgh: 1999)

• Access conditions: No material is available to be borrowed• Acquisition policy: Manuscripts and primary sources continue to be

acquired as and when they become available. This happens relatively rarely.

• Ownership: A number of the Britten manuscripts belong to the national collection at the British Library, and are deposited on permanent loan; the remainder are owned by the Britten-Pears Foundation. Many of the printers' copies, proofs and early editions of Britten's music are on loan from his publishers.

http://www.britten-pears.co.uk/Catalogue.htm







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Difficulties in Information Gathering• The shared vision problem• The academic – public divide problem• The ‘everyone knows what we have’ problem• The ‘we’ve already contributed to xx projects

already’ problem• The ‘we’d love to but we haven’t the

time/people/space’ problem• The ‘we can’t think about collections until all

our items are catalogued’ problem


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Cecilia – Why do it?

• To aid resource discovery– Many uncatalogued resources– Many unidentified resources

• Resource discovery informs retro-conversion and cataloguing priorities– It remains to be seen how this theoretical

benefit will work out in practice

• The availability of information about collections can help ensure their survival and development


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Cecilia – What’s in it for us?

• Collection descriptions:– Disclose information about collections– Provide an overview of otherwise uncatalogued

items– Result in increased use of our resources– Help to establish priorities for item level

cataloguing/conservation/digitisation– Identify potential for collaborations– Can be used in locally produced publicity, leaflets

etc


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Cecilia – the joined up approach

• Cecilia will be the top-level entry point to existing resource discovery tools:– Encore; the catalogue of performance sets

in public and academic libraries– Music Libraries Online; e-lib clump of

academic music libraries– Ensemble; retro-conversion of academic

music catalogues


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Cecilia – the joined up approach (2)

• Cecilia will link to relevant cross-domain resources, e.g.– The Archives Hub– AIM25– Cornucopia– Archon– CIMCIM Directory of Musical Instrument

Collections


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Cecilia – the joined up approach (3)

• The Cecilia database will be made publicly available via the PADS website

• PADS maintains a suite of arts related online resources

• It will be possible to execute a high level search across several resources including Cecilia


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Cecilia – Where we are now

• Database contains descriptions of over 1,000 collections in ca. 300 institutions

• Currently carrying out tests with PADS WebObjects software

• Public launch in February / March 2003

• Updates at approximately six monthly intervals


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Blessed Cecilia

Appear in Visions to All Musicians,

Appear and Inspire

Collection Description Focus Workshop 4 (8 November 2002) 1 Cecilia Towards a Collection Level...

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