CFAL Blog

Many of the British Library’s rare or unique 16th-century music editions are now freely available online, thanks to a partnership between Royal Holloway, University of London, the British Library and JISC.

The Early Music Online project has digitised from microfilm more than 320 anthologies of printed music from the 16th century. The earliest, a collection printed by Ottaviano Petrucci, dates from 1503. Highlights of the collection include sacred music by Josquin des Prez, Thomas Tallis and William Byrd; secular songs from Nuremberg, Paris and Lyon; lute music from Venice and organ music from Leipzig. Over 9000 individual compositions have been digitised.

You can access these digitised editions free of charge via http://www.earlymusiconline.org

Links to the digitised music have also been embedded in the catalogue records in the British Library catalogue (http://explore.bl.uk), COPAC (www.copac.ac.uk) and the RISM UK database (www.rism.org.uk). The project team has greatly expanded the existing catalogue records for these items, creating inventories of the contents of each anthology and adding bibliographical information such as transcribed title-pages and details of provenance. You can now search the digitised content by composer name, title of composition, name of printer/publisher, name of dedicatee, and place of printing/publication. We hope this will open up these important early music collections for further research, study and performance.

For university teachers, Early Music Online should be particularly useful in teaching such topics as: the history of 16th-century music; the history of music notation; the history of music printing; and performance practice. The digitised content includes examples of all the different notational systems used in 16th-century music (including mensural notation and also different types of lute tablature and keyboard tablature). Students can also learn much about performance styles by studying the original notation. Early Music Online contains hundreds of pieces unavailable in modern editions, and hence provides ample material for students interested in editing or performing previously inaccessible music.

The project was funded by the 2011 Rapid Digitisation Programme of JISC, the UK’s technology consortium for higher and further education.

If you have any comments on using Early Music Online, please contact Dr Stephen Rose, the Project Director (stephen.rose[at]rhul.ac.uk).

Happy Leap Day!

Italian composer Gioacchino Rossini was born on this day in 1792 – so he would be 220 today, or only 55 if you go by leap years!

The Italian composer is most famous for his operatic works – especially Italian comedies such as Il barbiere di Siviglia (The Barber of Seville) and La Cenerentola (Cinderella). His song-like melodies and popularity led to a special nickname, “The Italian Mozart”. Rossini retired from composing opera in 1829, but continued to compose (in other genres) for a few subsequent years. In the years leading up to his death in 1868 he remained largely silent as a composer.

Read more about Rossini, his works, and his life, online here. Alternatively, swing by your very own Crouch Fine Arts Library to check out these marvelous works of literature:

“Rossini: his life and works” by Richard Osbourne
ML410 .R8 O9 2007

“Rossini: his life and times” by Nicholas Till
ML410 .R8 T54 1983

“Vie de Rossini (Life of Rossini)” by Stendahl
ML410 .R8 S753 1985

Kudos to Baylor School of Music freshman, Stephen Farrell – one of three national finalists in the Gilberto Gagliardi Solo Trombone Competition! He will compete for the international prize in Paris, France, this summer at the International Trombone Festival.

This past Saturday was the final round in the Baylor Concerto Competition final round. Congratulations to Ricardo Gomez was named the winner and will perform Bartok’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in the fall with the orchestra.

Other finalists were:
Jill Chronister, cello – Lalo Concerto in D minor
Angel Elizondo, euphonium – Cosma Concerto
Deborah Hui, piano – Ravel
Garret Jones, clarinet – von Weber Concerto No. 2
Alexander Kostadinov, piano – Liszt Concerto No. 1
Matt Reynolds, horn – Pilss Concerto
Will Smith, oboe – Vaughan Williams

Congratulations to all of you!

CML just added another 1,409 albums (35,688 tracks) from the EMI label. There are now over 50,000 tracks of EMI content in the collection.

New content comes from EMI Classics, Angel Records, Capitol Catalog, and more.

Highlights include recordings by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Jussi Bjorling, Victoria De Los Angeles, Itzhak Perlman, Renata Scotto, Mstislav Rostropovich, London Symphony Orchestra, Taverner Choir, Maria Callas, Jon Vickers, Melos Ensemble, Pinchas Zuckerman, Borodin Quartet, Christoph Eschenbach, Elly Ameling, Trio Sonnerie, Alban Berg Quartett, Chung Trio, John Ogdon, and more.

Also included in this release are hundreds of full length operas, including:
*Puccini – Turandot (Maria Callas, Teatro alla Scala)
*Puccini – La Bohème (Mirella Freni, Teatro dell’Opera Di Roma)
*Mozart – Don Giovanni (Joan Sutherland, Philharmonia Orchestra)
*Puccini – Tosca (Placido Domingo, Philharmonia Orchestra)
*Mozart – Così fan tutte (Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Philharmonia Orchestra)
*R. Strauss – Elektra (Eva Marton, des Bayerischen Rundfunks)
*Donizetti – Don Pasquale (Beverly Sills, Ambrosian Opera)
*Gounod – Faust (Thomas Allen, National Opera of Paris)
*Bellini – Norma (Maria Callas, Teatro alla Scala)
*Massenet – Manon (Roberto Alagna, La Monnaie)
…and many more.

Other new albums include:
*Walton conducts Walton: Symphony No. 1, Belshazzar’s Feast
*Bela Bartók: Mikrokosmos Books 1-6
*Ireland: Piano Concerto and solo piano works
*Mendelssohn: Elias
*Penderecki: Orchestral Works
*Joyne Hands – English Renaissance Music
*Barry Tuckwell: Horn Concertos
*Simon Rattle Edition: Britten
*Karlheinz Stockhausen: Spiral 1 & Japan
*20th Century Classics: Arvo Pärt

Altogether, CML now includes 134,381 tracks

Music Online, the umbrella interface for all the Alexander Street Press music resources (available to Baylor folks) now includes:
764,751 tracks
100,030 pages text reference
24,977 scores (417,083 pages)
889 hours of video

get busy listening!

CML has added 459 albums (8,384 tracks) from a wide variety of labels, including new releases from Haenssler Classics, Mode Records, Bridge, Vox, and Wirripang.

New material includes compositions by Frank Bridge, Benjamin Britten, Arnold Bax, Gustav Mahler, Charles Koechlin, Wolfgang Rihm, Elliott Carter, Edvard Grieg, Morton Feldman, Aldo Clementi, Antonio Salieri, Lawrence Dillon, John Cage, Olivier Messiaen, Henry Fillmore, Morton Subotnick, Ursula Mamlok, Valentin Silvestrov, Giacinto Scelsi, Toru Takemitsu, and more.

Example new albums include:

*Olivier Messiaen: The Works for Orchestra (SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg)
*Pioneers and Exiles: Violin Music from Israel (Kolja Le ssing)
*Lute Music of the Renaissance: The Schele Manuscript Hamburg, 1619 (Joachim Held)
*Insects and Paper Airplanes: Chamber Music of Lawrence Dillon (Daedalus Quartet)
*Japanese Piano Works (Gerhard Oppitz)
*Arlene Sierra, Vol. 1 (Arlene Sierra)
*Australian Song Cycles, Vol. 1 (Wendy Dixon)
*Elliott Carter: Choral Works (SWR Vokalensemble Stuttgart)
*Bridge, Britten & Bax: Cello Sonatas (Johannes Moser, Paul Rivinius)
*Mozart: Complete Sonatas for Piano & Violin (Dmitry Sitkovetsky, Antonio Pappano, Konstantin Lifschitz)

You can browse the new content here — http://clmu.alexanderstreet.com/WhatsNew

Classical Music Library now contains 6,387 albums (98,693 tracks)

1. The only guy in ZZ Top who doesn’t have a beard is Frank Beard.
2. None of Elvis’s films got nominated for Oscar, but he did win three Grammy Awards – for his gospel recordings.
3. John Lennon wrote Good morning, good morning after hearing a Corn Flakes commercial.
4. Marilyn Monroe got a white poodle named Mafia from Frank Sinatra.
5. The airplane that Buddy Holly died in was called American Pie. Don McLean wrote a song with the same name about the accident.
6. Duran Duran was named after a mad scientist from the Jane Fonda movie Barbarella.
7. The first CD that was pressed in the U.S. was Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the USA.
8. Before composing Beethoven dipped his head in cold water.
9. Like humans, birds can learn music while they are still in the egg stage.
10. Mozart was five years old when he wrote his first piece.
11. The first pop video was released in 1975. It was Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen.
12. In 1976 Barry Manilow sang a chart topping song named I write the songs. The song wasn’t written by him.
13. Termites will eat wood two times faster when listening to heavy metal.
14. When Madonna was 15 years old, she got grounded for the whole summer, for sneaking out to see David Bowie in concert.
15. In the year 1988 tenor Luciano Pavarotti received a record 165 curtain calls at a Berlin opera house.
16. Make music not war : Monaco’s national orchestra is bigger that its army.
17. Wham !’s hit single Wake me up before you go go was written by George Michael who was inspired by the note that was left to his hotel room by another band member Andrew Ridgeley. The note was mistakenly written as “Don’t forget to wake me up up before you go go, George”.
18. House of the rising sun by The Animals was recorded with only 15 minutes because the band was on a tight budget. In spite of that the song went all the way to number one in 1964.
19. The longest song title is 305 characters (including spaces) : The Sad But True Story Of Ray Mingus, The Lumberjack Of Bulk Rock City, And His Never Slacking Stribe In Exploiting The So Far Undiscovered Areas Of The Intention To Bodily Intercourse From The Opposite Species Of His Kind, During Intake Of All The Mental Condition That Could Be Derived From Fermentation by Rednex.
20. When Billy Crystal was a child, his babysitter was the legendary Billie Holiday.
21. Suzanne Vega is considered the “mother” of the mp3 format. The creators of the mp3 used her voice from the song Tom’s Diner for analyzing the different sound spectrums when creating the compression algorithm.

Hello fellow Crouchsters! To commemorate the bicentennial of Franz Liszt’s birth, the Music Division of the Library of Congress has released a new web page!

Connect to this commemorative page by either visiting the Performing Arts Encyclopedia home page (http://www.loc.gov/performingarts/) or directly by clicking on Mr. Liszt’s handsome mug to the left!

The site features an introductory article and a biographical sketch, selected Liszt manuscripts, Liszt-related source materials, and descriptions of Liszt resources in the Library’s collections.

The Robert H. Young Memorial Concert will be at 3:00 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. on Sunday, October 23, in the Foyer of Meditation at Armstrong Browning Library.

Seating is limited, so free tickets are required. To secure tickets, call the School of Music box office at 254-710-3571. Be sure to specify how many you desire and whether you prefer to attend the afternoon performance or the evening performance.

This concert, celebrating the life of Robert H. Young (who passed away on July 29 at the age of 88), will include performances by the Baylor University Chamber Singers and Baylor University Chamber Orchestra, with the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Edward Elgar, Samuel Barber, Morten Lauridsen, and of course Dr. Young himself.

Can the power of music make the brain come alive? Throughout his career Dr. Oliver Sacks, neurologist and acclaimed author, has encountered myriad patients who are struggling to cope with debilitating medical conditions, including autism and Tourette’s syndrome. While their ailments vary, many have one thing in common: an appreciation for the therapeutic effects of music. NOVA follows four individuals—two of whom are Sacks’s case studies—and even peers into Sacks’s own brain to investigate music’s strange and surprising power over the human mind.