Mount A Libraries: Music Subject Guide: Welcome

Music Library Quick Links

Music Subject Guide
This guide is designed to help you find resources and assist in research for topics in Music.
Useful Databases for Music
Find music reference sources, journal articles, streaming audio, music scores online, and more!
Journal Finder
Music Department Publications
Explore digitized archival materials from the Department of Music, including concert and recital programs dating from 1967–2009.
Mount Allison Concert Recordings
An index to the music recorded since 1980 on audiocassette or compact disc of Department of Music concerts by faculty, guests, departmental ensembles, and students. Concert programs are included with each recording. Recordings are available in the Alfred Whitehead Music Library.
Sheet Music Collection
An index to the 7000-piece collection of sheet music in the Music Library. Holdings, not entered into the Libraries’ catalogue, include choral sheet music, popular songs, and pieces of classical sheet music organized by type (either keyboard, solo vocal, or instrumental pieces).

Selected Reference Sources for Music

Grove Music Online This link opens in a new window
Part of Oxford Music Online, Grove Music Online is the authoritative resource for music research with over 51,000 articles written by nearly 9,000 scholars charting the diverse history, theory and cultures of music around the globe.
Oxford Music Online This link opens in a new window
Includes the Oxford Dictionary of Music, the Oxford Companion to Music, and Grove Music Online. Grove is the most comprehensive source of the three, and may be easier to search on its own for some topics. To do so, use the Grove Music Online link in the A-Z list.

The Oxford Companion to Music by Alison Latham (Editor)
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9780198662129
Publication Date: 2002-05-02
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music by Colin Larkin
Call Number: Ebook
ISBN: 9780195313734
Publication Date: 2006-11-20
Writing about Music by Richard Wingell
Call Number: ML 3979 W.54 2009 REF
ISBN: 9780136157786
Publication Date: 2007-12-29

Novanet: Start your research here.

Quick search for books, ebooks, articles, scores, recordings & more

Looking for a specific musical work?
Tip: Search using composer name and title words. Example: mozart AND nozze (with AND in upper case).

Novanet Advanced Search

A new version of Novanet has just been launched!

Help: find search tips and a brief overview of what's new in the new Novanet:

Novanet Search Tips | Which Search Tool Should I Use?

You can search for recordings in Novanet.

Can't find the recording you are looking for? Search directly in our main streaming platform, Naxos Music Library. If you are looking for physical media, Novanet searches our CDs and some but not all of our LP records. Still having trouble? Contact the Music Library for help!

Help: Which Search Tool Should I Use? | Novanet Search Tips

Looking for Mount Allison Department of Music recordings?

All Mount Allison concert recordings on CDs (since 2002) are searchable in Novanet. Earlier recordings on cassette tape and reel-to-reel tape can be searched using our concert recording index:

Mount Allison Concert Recordings
An index to the music recorded since 1980 on audiocassette or compact disc of Department of Music concerts by faculty, guests, departmental ensembles, and students. Concert programs are included with each recording. Recordings are available in the Alfred Whitehead Music Library.

You can search for scores in Novanet.

After running your search with the composer and title of a work, use the Resource Type filter on the left side and limit to "Scores". (You may have to expand the list of resource types by clicking Show More.

Can't find the score you are looking for? Check one of our digital scores services like the Classical Scores Library, IMSLP, or nkoda (contact the Music Library for access). Still having trouble? Contact the Music Library for help!

Help: Which Search Tool Should I Use? | Novanet Search Tips

Sheet Music Collection (Alfred Whitehead Music Library, Mount Allison)
An index to the 7000-piece collection of sheet music in the Music Library. Holdings, not entered into the Libraries’ catalogue, include choral sheet music, popular songs, and pieces of classical sheet music organized by type (either keyboard, solo vocal, or instrumental pieces).

Key Online Resources for Music

Grove Music Online This link opens in a new window
Part of Oxford Music Online, Grove Music Online is the authoritative resource for music research with over 51,000 articles written by nearly 9,000 scholars charting the diverse history, theory and cultures of music around the globe.
Oxford Music Online This link opens in a new window
Includes the Oxford Dictionary of Music, the Oxford Companion to Music, and Grove Music Online. Grove is the most comprehensive source of the three, and may be easier to search on its own for some topics. To do so, use the Grove Music Online link in the A-Z list.
RILM Abstracts of Music Literature This link opens in a new window
Comprehensive international bibliography of music literature including articles, books, conference proceedings, bibliographies, catalogues, theses, reviews, etc. Coverage: from 1967; currency of title coverage varies.
ProQuest (All Databases) This link opens in a new window
Search all ProQuest databases simultaneously: ABI, Canadian Research Index, CBCA, Periodicals Archive Online, the Politics Collection (PAIS, Policy File Index, Political Science Database, Worldwide Political Abstracts), Philosopher's Index, ProQuest Central, Research Library, and the Historical Newspapers collections of the Globe & Mail (1844-2013) and Toronto Star (1894-2015).
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Full-text archive of journals in the Arts & Humanities, Social Sciences and Sciences. Current and recent volumes (last 2 to 5 years) not available for most titles.

Encyclopedia of Popular Music (Oxford Reference Online)
First published in 1992, The Encyclopedia of Popular Music is the largest project ever undertaken for the subject. This authoritative biographical encyclopedia of rock, pop, and jazz artists covers popular music from 1900 to the present, including folk, blues, world music, rock, heavy metal, techno, reggae, and hip hop. In addition to thousands of biographical entries, this A-Z reference also includes entries covering popular music genres, trends, styles, record lables, venues, and festivals. Key dates, biographies, and further reading are provided for artists covered, along with complete discographies that include record labels, release dates, and a 5-star album rating system. From Grateful Dead to The Killers, from Whitesnake to White Stripes, from R.E.M. to Blink-182, from The Jazz Singer to Jerry Springer - The Opera, and from Bye Bye Birdie to Rent, The Encyclopedia of Popular Music, Fourth Edition has something informative and clever to say about everyone's favorite band.
Oxford Bibliographies for Music
Oxford Bibliographies provide authoritative resources on over 250 topics in music. Written and reviewed by academic experts, every article in the database is an authoritative guide to the current scholarship, containing original commentary and annotations.
Full list of databases for music

Naxos Music Library This link opens in a new window
Streaming audio service; more than a million tracks of music across a broad spectrum of styles and periods. Important note: we have a limited number of user spaces for this resource. Please log out when you’re done.
Naxos Music Library Jazz This link opens in a new window
An extensive collection of jazz music available for streaming.
Naxos Spoken Word Library This link opens in a new window
Comprehensive collection of classic audiobooks and independent publisher productions,
Naxos Video Library This link opens in a new window
Extensive streaming video library of classical music performances, opera, ballet, live concerts and documentaries.
Naxos Music Library World This link opens in a new window
An extensive collection of world music recordings.
AVON via Alexander Street This link opens in a new window
Stream hundreds of informative videos and documentaries. This database provides the abilities to create and customize clips, read along with transcripts, and provides persistent linking for all your research.
Berlin Philharmonic Digital Concert Hall This link opens in a new window
**You will need to create a free account to log in and view the library.**
Streamed concerts archived and live performances. Each season, around 40 concerts are broadcast live and they can also be viewed at a later date in the concert archive. The archive contains hundreds of recordings. There are also documentaries and bonus films.
Medici.tv This link opens in a new window
This classical music channel features over 1,800 programs (3,000 original works), including concerts and archived historical concerts, operas, ballets, documentaries, artist portraits, and educational programs and master classes.
Marquee TV This link opens in a new window
JAN. 13, 2023: Mount Allison's Marquee account has been suspended.
We are investigating this issue and will get service restored as soon as possible. Please contact infodesk@mta.ca for assistance. Marquee TV is a premium streaming video service featuring dance, opera, theatre, and music. Go to our Moodle page to get the log in information.

The Global Jukebox
The Global Jukebox makes available to the general public, scholars and scientists all of the data and many of the analyses of the research into the expressive arts carried out under the direction of Alan Lomax and the anthropologist Conrad Arensberg from 1960 to 1995 at Columbia University and Hunter College/CUNY. Songs are organized by geography in the Map View, and by culture in the Tree View. Access to some songs is subject to tribal permission.
The Great 78 Project
"The Great 78 Project is a community project for the preservation, research and discovery of 78 rpm records. From about 1898 to the 1950s, an estimated 3 million sides (~3 minute recordings) have been made on 78 rpm discs. While the commercially viable recordings will have been restored or remastered onto LP’s or CD, there is still research value in the artifacts and usage evidence in the often rare 78 rpm discs and recordings." Click on Discovery to listen to digitized 78 rpm recordings.

Classical Scores Library This link opens in a new window
Contains 400,000 pages of classical scores from both in-copyright and public domain editions. Works of major and lesser known composers, Renaissance to 21st century.
IMSLP: Petrucci Music Library This link opens in a new window
The International Music Score Library Project features a large and growing collection of downloadable public domain music.
nkoda
Contact the Music Library to set up your free account to get started.
Curate playlists with your favourite editions of works and view them in your personal library across all your devices. Share your markings with your students, orchestra, ensemble or friends via Whatsapp, Facebook or any of your other socials.

IPA Source This link opens in a new window
"The web's largest library of International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) transcriptions and literal translations of opera arias and art song texts."
IPANow! Online
IPANow! Online by PhoneticSoft is a one-of-a-kind web application that transcribes English, Latin, Italian, German, Spanish and French texts into International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) symbols by applying rules utilized by scholarly lyric diction textbooks.

Log in information is available via the Libraries & Archives Moodle page.