Monday, September 20, 2010

New Content added to Music Online

A message from Alexander Street Press - Jazz and Contemporary World Music additions!

The MOST exciting news is the addition of the Blue Note label to Jazz Music Library. We've been working on licensing Blue Note for quite awhile and so are very pleased to have finally started loading their content.

The other exciting news is that all of the new tracks run at both 192kbps and 320kbps bitrates.

JAZZ MUSIC LIBRARY

850 albums (8,000 tracks) from Blue Note, EMI, Angel Records, Capitol Records, and Vanguard Records. The new content includes releases by Benny Goodman, Buddy Rich, Bobby McFerrin, Nancy Wilson, Cassandra Wilson, Wynton Marsalis, Louis Prima, Nigel Kennedy, Bernadette Peters, and more. Great recordings include:

*Duke Ellington Live at the Blue Note

*The Complete Imperial Sessions: Sonny Criss

*The Rudy van Gelder Edition CDs of Sonny Rollins, Herbie Hancock, Walter Davis Jr, Andrew Hill, Dexter Gordon, and more

*Benny Green Live at the Village Vanguard

*David Axelrod at Capitol Records (1966-1970)

*The Complete Capitol Recordings of Art Tatum

*The Complete Blue Note Recordings of Herbie Nichols

*Kenny Burrell 75th Birthday Bash Live


CONTEMPORARY WORLD MUSIC

99 albums from Virgin India, Angel Records, Air Mail Music, Playasound, Piranha, Tropical Music, and PAN Records. New material includes Indian Classical music, African drumming, cumbia, African gospel, chant, ritual music and more. Example new albums include:


*Ravi Shankar Collection

*Anoushka Shankar: Anourag

*Swar Shikhar - The Taj Heritage Series

*Samba Touré: Songhai Blues: Homage to Ali Farka Toure

Music Online now contains:

309,704 tracks

21,973 albums

66,855 pages text reference

21,878 scores (369,844 pages)

426 videos

Enjoy the new content!

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

New Send-to-Mobile functionality in Alexander Street streaming collections

We now have "Send-to-Mobile" functionality in Music Online, including all of the individual streaming music collections and some items in Opera in Video. This functionality will follow in all of our Alexander Street streaming video collections later this year.

What this means is that you can now send an audio track, video track, album, or playlist from our streaming collections to your mobile device to listen to later. The item that you send stays on your device for 48 hours.


Go to any of our Alexander Street streaming music databases and look for a cell phone icon ("Send-to-Mobile") next to each track, album, or playlist. Wherever you see that icon you can click it and obtain a “shortlink” to send and enable playback on your mobile device.

We provide several methods to send this link:
* We can send a text message to your mobile.

* We can email the link to your email address, which you can pick up on your mobile.

* You can enter the link URL manually into your mobile's web browser.

* On supported devices you can scan a QR-Code directly from your computer screen. You will need to download a QR-Code reader application to do so.

At this time, this functionality is supported on:

* Apple iPhone on 3G network or better

* Mobile Device with Android OS


Shortlinks cannot be accessed outside of your institution network after 48 hours but will still be usable within it.

For more information please visit the Help page at http://muco.alexanderstreet.com/help/view/using_your_mobile_device


Let us know what you think.

Friday, June 25, 2010

New Web Resources page

One of our student employees, Sonia Archer-Capuzzo (DMA in Clarinet and now in the LIS program here at UNCG) has done a great job of re-vamping our web resources page.  It is expanded, re-organized and annotated.  Give it a gander and let us know what you think. Should we add something, change something?  We're all ears!

http://library.uncg.edu/info/depts/music/web_resources.aspx

Thanks, Sonia!

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

New content for Music Online from Alexander Street Press

We have updated the Music Online collection with the following new material:



JAZZ MUSIC LIBRARY

120 albums (1,508 tracks) from Concord Jazz, Contemporary, Jazz Alliance, Jazzology, Neon Tonic, Playboy Jazz, and Riverside. New material includes recordings from Sonny Rollins, Pete Escovedo, Art Farmer, Doc Evans, Bobby Darin, Sarah Vaughan, Tito Puente, and more.


Example new albums include:

Bobby Darin: Live! At the Desert Inn
Swiss Dixie Stompers: Petite Fleur
Ray Bush’s BBC Jazz: American Jazz With A British Accent
Marian McPartland’s Piano Jazz: Bill Evans
Doris Day: The Love Album

OPERA IN VIDEO


Subtitles released for the following operas:

Cosi Fan Tutte (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592116)
Carmen (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592122)
Die Walkure (Netherlands Opera) (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592013)
Die Walkure (Liceu) (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/591994)
Don Carlo (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581032)
Don Giovanni (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/577883)
Il Barbiere di Siviglia (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/580998)
Il Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578543)
Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578541)
Il Viaggio a Reims (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592048)
La Boheme (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578396)
La Cenerentola (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581017)
La Fille du Regiment (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592137)
La Traviata (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/592066)
Le Nozze di Figaro (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578410)
L’incoronazione di Poppea (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578539)
L’Orfeo (2006, Het Muziektheater) (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/578508)
L’Orfeo (2002, Liceu) (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581262)
Luisa Fernanda (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581027)
Macbeth (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581257)
Otello (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/579054)
Tamerlano (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/591981)
The Rake’s Progress (http://opiv.alexanderstreet.com/View/581019)


CONTEMPORARY WORLD MUSIC


236 albums (3,853 tracks) from ARC Music, Blue Flame Records, Buda Musique, Celestial Harmonies, INEDIT, Lyrichord, PAN Records, and Tropical Music. New material released includes Afro-pop, cumbia, electronic music, world fusion, klezmer, griot music, joropo, funeral music, and more.


Example new albums released include:

In the Time of My Fourth Great-Grandfather: Western Sisaala Music from Lambussie, Ghana
Mother Volga: Volga Matj, Music of the Volga Ugrians
El Houssaine Kili: Safran
Stewart Sukuma: Afrikiti
Novedades De Chile


Music Online now contains:


258,367 tracks
17,897 albums
64,898 pages text reference
17,265 scores (330,852 pages)
407 videos


Enjoy the new content and the new subtitles!

Saturday, April 3, 2010

April 1, 2010

Favorite new book on April 1, 2010 (tee hee - get it?)

Corey Bellis' display for AMS-SE

The Wonderful Corey Bellis made a display for the regional AMS meeting which was held at UNCG on Saturday, March 27, 2010.   Messiaen's piece "Quarter For The End of Time" was the topic of the keynote address.  Here are some photos of the display and our keynote speaker, Rob Fallon, enjoying the display (along with Aaron Allen and Kailan Rubinoff).  Notice the *colors* - can you say synesthesia?  [There is also a photo of Corey at the end as a segue to our (slightly late) April 1 post...] THANKS, Corey!


Monday, March 29, 2010

New streaming video database - Opera in Video!

We have a new streaming video database!
Opera in Video from Alexander Street Press! From Monteverdi's "L'Orfeo" (two performances to choose from) to Messiaen's "Saint François d'Assise" or Adams' "Doctor Atomic" and a bunch of stuff in between.
Go go "O" in the database list and, wow...here is the official description:
Opera in Video will contain 250 of the most important opera performances, captured on video through staged productions, interviews, and documentaries. Selections represent the world’s best performers, conductors, and opera houses and are based on a work’s importance to the operatic canon. This release includes 147 videos, equalling 316 hours. You can also access Opera in Video through the Music Online interface.
Let me know if you have any questions.
cheers,

Sarah
sbdorsey@uncg.edu

Monday, March 15, 2010

P.S. on streaming video databases

In the cool colleague category:

After my last posting I got a message from our excellent Distance Education Librarian (Beth Filar-Williams) asking if I would spread the good word about her DE page on streaming media.

Here it is:

http://library.uncg.edu/de/onlinefilms.asp

This is useful for both UNCG and non-UNCG peeps - take a look at the last section -  "Other Free Streaming Film Sites"

Feel free to send us your favorite sites if you don't see them there (sbdorsey@uncg.edu and efwilli3@uncg.edu)

Thanks, Beth! 

Enjoy, y'all!

Sarah

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Three Library Database Announcements

Hello and happy almost Spring Break!

1. The music database called The Music Index has switched software suppliers and is now an "Ebsco" database. The good news is that you can now search both RILM and Music Index at the same time (top of screen, click on "choose databases" and make sure they are both checked). The bad news is that you might *think* you are searching one of those databases when you are searching the other...BEWARE!

2. New cool video resource: Films on Demand – thousands of full-length, streaming educational films. Go to the database list, click on "F" and click on the title (Films on Demand). Once you are in the database, click on "Humanities and Social Science" and in addition to the 134 music videos, there are also all sorts of other cool categories – go wild over spring break!

3. We have a trial of a database called Ethnographic Video Online through May 3rd. The collection covers every region of the world and features the work of many of the most influential documentary filmmakers of the 20th century, including interviews, previously unreleased raw footage, field notes, study guides, and more. This first release includes 226 videos. Just go to "E" in the database list and click on the database title. Please let me know what you think of it so we can decide if we want to add it to our streaming collection (sbdorsey@uncg.edu).

Friday, February 26, 2010

Cool info on Streaming Audio Playlists

One of the cool things about the streaming audio databases we have is the ability to create playlists.  So professors can make playlists for their classes to use or individuals can keep their fav tunes together.  The Alexander Street Press playlists are pretty straightforward on their website.  The Naxos instructions for faculty are more involved, so with the help of my dear friend Diane Steinhaus over at UNC Chapel Hill (and a little nudging from Jim Douglass here at UNCG), here are some helpful hints:

Creating Playlists in Naxos Music Library

A: Professors or Administrators [B: Students – see below!!]

You have the ability to create institutional playlists by logging in with the professor/administrator password at www.NaxosMusicLibrary.com (ask Sarah for the password) .Once logged in, click on the playlist tab at the top of the page. It has a user-friendly interface, and there is also a PDF Playlist User Guide on the right of the screen. This walks you through the process step-by-step or see below. NOTE: Be careful not to delete/edit playlists that aren't yours! Unless you lock your list and create a password, we all have the same access through the username and password.
Open either Internet Explorer or Firefox. Go to www.naxosmusiclibrary.com (rather than going through the library's web site)
Log in at www.naxosmusiclibrary.com with username and Password you can get from Sarah.
Once you are logged in, search for the recordings you want to put in a playlist. When you are in the screen for a particular CD, click the tracks you want to include (or click the whole work). Click on the + sign next to the track to see the performers.
Once you've selected the track(s) you want, select Add to Playlist from the menu on the left side of the screen. The first time you do this, Select locations Tab = My Playlists, Folder = Current; and name a New Playlist – save to UNCG tab if you want others to see it! [There is a limit of 60 tracks or 4 hours per playlist.]
Once your playlist is complete, select Playlists from the upper toolbar (in this same login) to create and name a folder for your class (eg. MUS437/637).
Under the UNCG Playlists, select and name a New Folder. Then click on the My Playlists tab, put a check box next to your playlist, select Move Playlist to move your list to the UNCG playlists (from My Playlists). Select the University of North Carolina Greensboro tab, and select the folder you want to move your playlist(s) to.
Now your playlist(s) will be accessible to students who visit Naxos from the library website.
STUDENTS: Students may create your own, private playlists. Go to Naxos through the UNCG library website as usual. Click on the Playlist tab on the top of the page. Click on Student/Member Playlists and Sign-up. Follow the instructions and you will be ready to create your own playlists from any piece in the Naxos Music Library. Each time you access the NML, you will need to sign-in to the student playlists to access your personal playlists.

Have fun, everyone and if you have any questions, ask Diane or Jim...ha ha, JOKE - ask me, Sarah, anytime!

Monday, February 15, 2010

How to be a BAD Music Library User Taking Good Care of Music Library Materials

Back in August, I wrote a post entitled Some Reminders for our ML Patrons that listed several ways in which you, as a Music Library user, could treat the library well. Today I’m going to address two of those items in greater detail and provide photographic evidence of ways in which Music Library materials have been treated badly. I'll also list the possible costs of various types of damage. (Click on photos for larger view, if needed.)

Please don't write, put tape on or in any way manipulate Library materials, this includes scores.
Here’s the deal, folks. Materials that you borrow from a library do not belong to you. They are not yours; you are borrowing them for a limited amount of time. (Yes, I am aware that I’m being repetitive. I’m hoping that it will help to make my point.) Once you return an item, someone else is going to use it. Shouldn’t they get a chance to use it in pristine condition?

[Writing] Those markings that you made in a score may have been helpful to you, but the person using it after you doesn’t want to see them. You may be saying to yourself, but isn’t it okay as long as I use a pencil? No! Erasing, even when you use a gentle stroke and a special gummy eraser, damages paper. There is a simple solution, just don’t do it. If you’re studying a score in a way that’s going to lead you to write it in, shouldn’t you purchase it for your personal library anyway? That way you, your studio teacher or your accompanist can do as much score marking as you wish.

Cost: $.25 per page for pencil marks; $.50 per page for ink, highlighter, crayon, etc.











[Tape] Tape is an enemy of paper! Audrey Sage of Preservation Services in Jackson Library tells me that, “Tape rots paper.” There it is folks - from an expert, tape and paper don’t mix as far as library materials are concerned. (Please don’t attempt to repair library items with tape; there's more about that in the last section of this post.)

I’ve also noticed lately that some scores have been coming back to the Music Library with photocopies taped to them. It appears that this is done for ease of page turning. Accompanists, please, please don’t do it. Ask someone to turn pages for you.
Cost: Up to $5.00 per page








[Post-it Notes, Sticky Flags, Paper Clips, Folds, etc] Here’s the rule: don’t attach anything to library materials. Sticky things like post-it notes and those handy flags leave chemicals that break down paper. Paperclips, especially the uncoated ones, leave rust stains. Paperclips also damage paper by leaving indentations behind. Folding pages weakens them and leads to rips and tears. If you need to keep your place, use a bookmark or a slip of paper.
Cost: $.10 per post-it notes, flags, paper clip, fold, etc.; More for ripped pages





[Pets] This one is easy! When you take library materials home, make sure that you leave them in a place where your pets can’t reach them.
Cost: from $15 for new cover to $125 for replacement








[Liquids] Keep library materials dry. If it’s raining, ask a library staff member for a bag to protect your scores and books. Don’t drop your library book in a puddle. When you’re at home, don’t read library materials while you’re having a soak in the tub. Don’t spill your coffee on library materials. Be careful! If an item does get wet, bring it to the Music Library immediately. The quicker the wet item can be dealt with the lower the chance that it will have to be replaced and the lower the fees that you will be charged.
Costs: varies according to the amount of damage, but can be as high as $125 for replacement



If a Library item in your possession is or becomes damaged, please do not attempt to repair it. Bring the item back to us and we will send it to the Preservation staff at Jackson Library for repair.
Do-It-Yourself is never a good idea when it comes to repairing library materials. Even if it’s just one ripped page, bring the item to the Music Library and we’ll enlist the help of Audrey Sage and Stefani Hobbick in the University Libraries Preservation Services Department. In emergency cases, we’ll even walk the item to Jackson Library, have Stefani or Audrey repair it on the spot, and bring the item back to you.







Some Important Links

University Libraries' Library Crimes

Dean of Students Office's Academic Integrity Misuse of Academic Resources

Music Library Assocaition's Repairs and Conservation of Scores and Sheet Music

American Library Association's Code of Ethics

If you have any questions about damaged library items, please leave a comment or contact me at mkamos@uncg.edu. If you think of other examples of things one shouldn’t do to library materials, please share those as well.

Thanks for taking care of our stuff!
mka, Your Evening/Weekend Music Library Manager

All photos by Mallory McComas, Veteran Music Library Student Assistant