Music: By Subject Subject Guide

History and Musicology

14 resources available
- Restricted to WMU users  - Open Access

See also Guides to the Field in the Music: General guide for more books on music research and library skills and resources.

Books on Music History and Musicology

General histories, ML 160-161; by time period, ML 162-197; by country, ML 197-350 (General Stacks)
Musicology/Ethnomusicology: ML 3797-3799 (General Stacks)

Guide to Library Research in Music

Ref ML 3797 .B29 2008
A textbook on library and computer-based research for music. Explains the research process, offers instruction in information-searching techniques and library-based organizational systems, and introduces an array of electronic and print music resources.

Music in Words: A Guide to Researching and Writing About Music

ML 3797 .H537 2009
This is both a textbook and a reference book "about the way we research music and write about it." Of British origin, this edition has been adapted for use in North America. Recommended for graduate students.

Music Treasures Consortium

"Provides online access to the world's most valued music manuscripts and print materials, held at the most renowned music archives...Researchers can search or browse materials, access metadata about each item, and view digital images of the treasure via each custodial archive's Web site. The consortial collection will grow as members add more materials."

Online Resources for Music Scholars

A resource from Harvard University's music library listing online resources of many types covering a variety of topics in music, including historical musicology, ethnomusicology, theory, composition, and performance practice. Most resources are accessible to all users (a few are limited to Harvard users).

American Musicological Society

Established in 1934 to advance research in various fields of music. Especially useful is their comprehensive list of "Web sites of interest to musicologists."

Center for Research Libraries - Music

CRL's music collections include source materials related to opera, English church music, jazz, instruments, American music prior to 1830, and many others. WMU faculty and students may borrow CRL materials through interlibrary loan.

Center for the History of Music Theory and Literature

Provides access to several music history- and theory databases, including Musical Borrowing: An Annotated Bibliography; Thesaurus Musicarum Latinarium and Saggi musicali italiani (databases of theory treatises).

College Music Society

Supporting research and scholarship in music.

Doctoral Dissertations in Musicology

Fully-searchable index to completed dissertations and new dissertation topics in music history, theory, and ethnomusicology, as well as related fields. Includes references to online databases where dissertations may be found.

Renaissance and Baroque Music Chronology: Composers

Timelines of composers and music history, twelfth through eighteenth centuries. Links to other sites.

RISM: Repertoire International des Sources Musicales

Ref ML 113 .I6
An inventory of music manuscripts, secondary sources, librettos, libraries. RISM's goal is to locate and catalog all surviving musical sources from the earliest times to about 1800. In print in the library.

RISM: Repertoire International des Sources Musicales: United Kingdom and Ireland

This site offers free access to RISM information about manuscripts in British and Irish libraries. Search or browse. Downloadable incipits are included.

US RISM/Themefinder

This site allows for searching of US libraries' holdings of manuscripts in the RISM AII database. Searching is by any of several dozen text fields, and the musical search boxes allow for fuzzy searching of music incipits. (Fuzzy searching is useful for finding concordances in which key, details of meter or rhythm, and placement of rests may prevent identification in literal searches.)

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