Reed College Library: Music

There are many handbooks, dictionaries, and encyclopedias that describe musical terms, names, subjects, etc. These reference sources provide give you a quick overview or summary of a topic:

General Sources

Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians
Ref ML105 .B16 2001
Compact biographies with musicians' worklists and short bibliographies. Also check out the Baker's offshoot, Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Twentieth-Century Classical Musicians, (Ref ML105 .S612 1997).

Oxford Music Online
Full-text reference work including the following titles: Grove Music Online, The Oxford Companion to Music, and the Oxford Dictionary of Music.

The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
Ref ML100 .N48 2001
Standard encyclopedia covering whole field from earliest times; includes music history, theory and practice, terms, biographies, songs and operas (does not include opera plots); signed articles by specialists. Online includes the New Grove Dictionary of Jazz and the New Grove Dictionary of Opera.

The Harvard Dictionary of Music
Ref ML100 .A64 2003
Expands the scope of earlier editions to reflect current musical scholarship and "changes in the character of musical life"; very few articles based on earlier editions; written by specialists; no biographies.

Specialized Sources

The New Grove Dictionary of American Music
Ref ML101 .U6 N48 1986
Signed articles, written by specialists, on the music of the United States; includes bibliographies.

New Grove Dictionary of Jazz
Ref ML102 .J3 N48 2001
Covers individuals, groups, styles, terminology and theory, instruments, record labels, films, festivals, etc.; largest dictionary of this music ever published; extensive bibliographies. (Now included in the online New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.)

The New Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments
Ref ML102 .I5 N48 1984
Covers instruments of classical Western music and their makers, modern Western instruments, performing practice, non-Western and folk or traditional instruments.

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera
Ref ML102 .O6 N5 1992
The last of the "spin-offs" from the larger Grove's, completely updated and with new articles added. Covers all facets of opera, including singers, individual operas, composers, librettists, cities, etc. See also online version, described below. (Now included in the online New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.)

Duckles, Music Reference and Research Materials
Ref ML113 .D83 1997
Annotated guide to reference works and research tools; entries arranged by form: dictionaries, encyclopedias, histories, etc.; excellent guide to research in music.

Heyer, Historical Sets, Collected Editions and Monuments of Music: A Guide to Their Contents
Ref ML113 .H52 1980 (Also a copy in IMC)
Lists the contents and bibliographical information for the complete editions of the music of individual composers and the major collections of music; vol. 1 contains text, vol.2, index; 1300 entries

Style Manuals

Writing About Music
Reserve IMC ML3797 .I79 1999 (Also a copy in the stacks.)
Handbook of citation format guidelines used in writing about music.

Databases

Academic Search Premier (1975 - present)
Use this for fulltext and abstract access to Guitar Player, American Record Guide and other more popular periodicals.

International Index to Music Periodicals (IIMP)
Indexes articles and reviews in music journals, from 1784 - present. Abstracts from 1996. Somewhat less scholarly coverage than RILM Abstracts. Includes lots of record reviews. Quite current, but less useful in general.

JSTOR
Searchable electronic archive of the fulltext of many journals. Coverage is from first date of publication to three to five years before the present date.

Lexis-Nexis Academic
Use this for access to the New York Times fulltext from 2002 - present. Includes a large number of fulltext newspapers with coverage from 1970, including English-language international newspapers.

Project Muse (1993 - present)
Searchable electronic archive of the fulltext of hundreds of journals in many subjects, including music.

RILM Abstracts (1967 - present)
Includes abstracts of books, articles, reviews, and dissertations. Scholarly focus; no popular material included. About 2 years behind in indexing.

RIPM: Retrospective Index to Music Periodicals (1800 - 1950)
Retrospective index to scholarly music publications, mostly in languages other than English. Includes citations to journal articles, essays in multi-author works, book reviews and dissertations in music. Scholarly focus.

WorldCat
The OCLC Online Union Catalog; over 24 million records describing items owned by libraries around the world. Includes books, journal and newspaper titles (but not references to individual articles), sound recordings, musical scores, films, manuscripts, etc. published in any year since about 1000. Includes Interlibrary loan button for easy borrowing from other libraries.

Selected Websites

Berklee College of Music Library
Includes title indexes to popular tunes, both on record and in printed collections, and to performers (including sidemen) on recordings.

New York Public Library for the Performing Arts
The homepage for the New York Public Library's Performing Arts Library contains information about each of the major collections housed in this facility. Finer detail in cataloging access than with most library catalogs.

WWW Sites of Interest to Musicologists
From the webpage of the American Musicology Society. Includes links to many useful sites of interest to music history students.

Library

Research Guide for Music

Contact: Jack Levine , Acquisitions Librarian

Getting Started

General Sources

Specialized Sources

Style Manuals

Databases

Selected Websites