Music Documentation Research Articles

Unlocking the Riddles of Classical Greek Melodies I: Dorian Keys to the Harmonic Revolution of the New Music and the Hellenistic Musical Documents

Abstract Bringing together evidence preserved by Aristoxenus, Aristides Quintilianus, Ptolemy, Porphyry and the Greek musical handbooks in a unified framework, this article and its sequels show how the reconstruction of the Classical modulation system offered in Lynch 2018 is confirmed by the melodies recorded in the Greek musical documents. Taken jointly, these articles offer the first comprehensive account of the use of notation tónoi in the ancient Greek musical documents that is fully consistent with the extant technical evidence on Greek harmonic theory and with literary testimonies about the harmonic innovations introduced by the New Musicians. The present article focuses on the Classical/Hellenistic harmonic system, whereas its Imperial counterpart will be discussed in Lynch forthcoming 1 and 2. These theoretical analyses are based upon a newly developed database (dDAGM) that collects all the musical notes attested in the standard edition of the Greek musical fragments (DAGM), comprising over 3,500 notes.

Information Literacy Programmes: the Experience of Research Libraries in Hong Kong and Ukraine

The article is devoted to the analysis of information literacy programmes developed by libraries of higher education institutions in Hong Kong and Ukraine. The application of such theoretical and empirical methods as an analysis of sources, the method of external observation over the foreign and Ukrainian experience of the information literacy programmes developing, as well as a prognostic method for summarising, allowed to reveal similarities and differences in the content and forms of information literacy programmes implemented at Hong Kong and Ukrainian universities. Different stages of implementation of information literacy programmes by the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) Library during the last two decades are highlighted. The content of information literacy programmes provided by the libraries of 4 Ukrainian universities in general and the scientific library of the Kyiv National University of Culture and Arts (KNUCaA), in particular, is reviewed. It has been found out such similar characteristics of information literacy programmes of libraries that were analysed as using of traditional forms (lectures, practical exercises, instructions, video lessons) to form the skills and abilities for the effective information search, analytical processing, organisation, evaluation, and use of this information. It has been found out that, unlike Hong Kong, the introduction of certified and online information literacy courses by Ukrainian universities libraries is isolated cases. There is also no experience in testing students’ knowledge before studies of information literacy. Testing is usually done after completing the information literacy programmes, but these tests are not mandatory and only recommended. The authors hope that the experience of the CUHK Library (Hong Kong) in the implementation of the “Immersion Programme”, the UGCIL project, and InfoLit for U will be useful for the Ukrainian scientific library community, considering that libraries of higher education institutions in Ukraine have also started to develop similar programmes and modules. In particular, the interactive online guide “Music Documents in the KNUCaA Scientific Library” is an example of a modern approach to the formation of first-year students’ information literacy, their acquaintance with the scientific library, its services, and resources, basic types of documents, an electronic search algorithm.

Music Encoding Initiative (MEI), un estándar para la edición, codificación y la descripción de documentos musicales en el entorno digital: características, prestaciones y ámbitos de aplicación

El estándar MEI es un estándar XML exhaustivo y extensible para el marcado semántico de textos musicales en el ámbito digital. Su versatilidad lo ha convertido en el estándar más consolidado para la edición de música en el ámbito académico, gracias a la integración de recursos para la representación de cualquier tipo de obra, estilo, o época. Su carácter flexible y extensible, junto con la inclusión de elementos para la descripción bibliográfica y la posibilidad de integrar de manera unitaria tanto el texto marcado, como los metadatos que lo describen, lo convierten en un referente para la gestión de la documentación musical en el entorno digital. El presente trabajo constituye acercamiento al estándar MEI a través del análisis de su estructura, de sus elementos constitutivos, y su aplicación en el ámbito de la gestión de la documentación musical en archivos digitales y bases de datos.

Опыт активизации музыкально-этнографической работы во Львовской национальной музыкальной академии имени М. В. Лысенко

Ukrainian ethnomusicologist Lina Dobrianska (Лiна Добрянська) states in the article, that Lviv M. V. Lysenko National Academy of Music (LLNAM) is one of the main ethnomusicological institutions in Ukraine, which has deep traditions of musical folklore research works. At the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st centuries, musical and ethnographic activities at the Academy reached a qualitatively new level thanks to the versatile activity of the Musical Ethnology Problem Scientific Research Laboratory (MEPSRL) at LLNAM and the rapid development of its Archive. To date, its funds contain the largest national audio collection of traditional music from the Western Ukrainian and adjacent territories, as well as voluminous accompanying graphic materials. In the article, on the basis of numerous archival documents, a brief historical digression was prepared with a periodization of the main stages of practical musical and folklore studies in LLNAM in close connection with the educational process, the main factors that have made the development of the MEPSRL Archive on the verge of millennia been revealed. Key words: MEPSRL, LLNAM, musical and ethnographic archive, history of musical folklore, folk music documentation, musical ethnographic practice. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15181/td.v13i0.1705

Entangled Modernities in the Culture of Korean Music Publishing: Challenges in Establishing A Contemporary Korean Art Music Archive

Western musicology has traditionally treated musical source material—manuscripts, autograph scores, writings, early editions—as an essential component of scholarly investigation. However, scores and other music-related material from contemporary Korean composers, absent any central archiving institution, tend to accumulate only on an individual basis. Recently, South Korean governmental institutions have begun to promote and fund individuals seeking to establish a comprehensive archive for contemporary Korean music; nonetheless, many challenges remain due to the complex nature of music documentation and publishing culture in South Korea.

St. Anne in Renaissance Music: Devotion and Politics by Michael Alan Anderson, and: Music and Riddle Culture in the Renaissance by Katelijne Schiltz (review)

RENAISSANCESt. Anne in Renaissance Music: Devotion and Politics. By Michael Alan Anderson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. [xvii, 345 p. ISBN 9781107056244 (hardcover), $99; ISBN 9781139899604 (e-book), $79.] Music examples, illustrations, tables, appendices, endnotes, bibliography, index.Music and Riddle Culture in the Renaissance. By Katelijne Schiltz, with a catalog of enigmatic canonic inscriptions by Bonnie J. Blackburn. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2015. [xxx, 513 p. ISBN 781107082298 (hardcover), $135; ISBN 9781316309933 (e-book), $108.] Music examples, illustrations, tables, appendices, footnotes, bibliography, indexes (compositions, general).Popular devotion of the Middle Ages and Renaissance has received sustained scholarly attention, but despite some noteworthy studies, the musical aspect of the subject has lagged behind. The complex multidisciplinary research required to integrate music with liturgy, iconography, political and social history, and regional practices requires special patience, intuition, and skills. Only rarely is the function and impetus for a musical composition noted or implied, and texts set to music, though often drawn from liturgy or lay devotional books, were often altered to suit their musical purposes. Understanding the reasons and results of textual choices often requires sophisticated sleuthing. Michael Anderson notes, for art's sake was completely foreign to both the artist or composer and his noble patron. Art instead had a job to per- form, one that shifted according to circumstances. This principle would be easily grasped if the texts of the music for St. Anne . . . simply announced their functional intent. But such music does not exist (p. 3). Music for St. Anne spans the sacred, Latin-texted genres of the period: polyphonic motets, Mass Ordinaries, and liturgical plainchant. This book includes close readings of selected musical passages for all of these genres.A study focused on a topic rather than on a particular time, place, composer, patron, or musical genre or style brings together all of those entities, allowing a wide berth for discovery. The topical thread gathers related artifacts, beliefs, and stories not only across a generously proportioned Renaissance, but also from the predecessors of Renaissance ideas and customs. Anderson asks, How did Mary's mother, a woman not mentioned in the New Testament, rise to this lofty status, on a par with royalty and well suited to aid in maternity? (p. 1). Musical documentation of Anne's political force forges a trail to unexpected destinations and identifies her intimate ties to noble and royal families. Chapter 1 identifies Anne's attributes that were important to her devotees and shows their relevance to ruling families: the corporeality of Christ, motherhood, marriage, widowhood, noble lineage, female education, wealth, and well-being represented their most fervent beliefs, hopes, and ambitions. Anderson follows these tenets into the personal lives of the powerful patrons who called upon Anne.Plainchant frames the investigation, beginning with a versified plainchant Office for St. Anne preserved in the early-fifteenthcentury Turin Codex used at the Cypriot court of King Janus. The search for the genealogy of the Turin Office draws together threads from earlier studies, linking the Cypriot practices to English and French traditions with a common ancestor-a 1424 Benedictine breviary now at Oxford (Bodleian Library, MS Rawlinson C. 489). The texts of the Bodleian breviary, in turn, point to a tradition that predates the official sanctioning of Anne's feast day in 1378. New musicological subjects radiate from the chapter's quest to identify a tradition of St. Anne Office chants: a little-known web of related sources, some far-flung; the practice of ordering Office chants by mode; the phenomenon of versified Offices; and the unique musical repertory of Turin.Anderson digs deeper: compared with the Office for St. …

Heinrich Schenker and the Photogram Archive

ABSTRACTIn 1927 Anthony van Hoboken, at Heinrich Schenker's urging, founded the Archive for Photograms of Musical Master Manuscripts, the goal of which was to collect photographic reproductions of the autograph manuscripts of famous composers so that they could be made generally available for the purposes of study and preparing editions without the originals themselves being susceptible to damage. The administration of the Archive required a Board of Trustees, on which Schenker and the music historian Robert Haas sat under Hoboken's chairmanship. After the official inauguration of the Archive in October 1927, Hoboken and the Board of Trustees sent out an Appeal to publicise their intentions; this was followed by a radio broadcast, given by Otto Erich Deutsch, and several magazine articles which called attention to the new institution.In the years that followed, there were repeated conflicts of interest among the trustees. Tensions arose, for instance, in connection with the International Schubert Congress of 1928, organised by Hoboken and Haas under the auspices of the Archive, in which Schenker refused to participate. A collected edition of the works of C. P. E. Bach, planned in 1930, never materialised: Schenker could not be persuaded to act as one of its editors. A crisis was reached in 1932, when Hoboken drastically reduced his annual financial contribution to the enterprise. Nonetheless, the Archive developed into an internationally recognised centre for musical documentation, whose holdings steadily increased over time.

Idle musical community: Dischord Records and anarchic DIY practice

Originally formed in 1980 to document the Teen Idle’s Minor Disturbance EP, Dischord Records has continued to document and support the local Washington, DC, hardcore punk music scene for over three decades through an anarchic Do-It-Yourself (DIY) ethic. Dischord’s DIY ethic affords a manner of music documentation, in contrast to production, and community formation that reconfigures the space of dominant commercial production and exchange. Dischord’s business practices, such as forming agreements with bands via handshake instead of legal contract, allow the label to resist consumerism and exploitation of both artists and audiences while fostering a creative space, where profit does not dictate the sound of the music or produce a commodified musical product. Ultimately, Dischord’s political potential is in its ethics to the extent that anarchic DIY practice constitutes a sort of inoperative community of circulation rather than production and profit. The implications of these practices relate to the ways in which music constitutes social and communal relations and its radical possibility of reconfiguring a space outside of commercial exchanges, whether in the political sphere or in the digital realm.

“Wooing to the muses allows of no vanity”

On the Congress of the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres (IAML), held in Moscow on June 27 - July 2, 2010.

Congress of the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres (The International IAML Congress)

Congress of the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres will be the first time in Russia, in Moscow. The article describes the preparatory work for the Congress.

A Lyrical Vision: The Music Documents of the U.S. Bishops by Edward Foley, O.F.M. Cap.

A Lyrical Vision: The Music Documents of the U.S. Bishops by Edward Foley, O.F.M. Cap.

Attila takes Rome: the reception of Verdi's opera on the eve of revolution

AbstractDrawing on a wealth of new historical and musical documentation as well as the patriotic hymns of 1848, this essay places the Roman premiere of Attila at the forefront of revolutionary unrest. It also responds seriously to the claim that Verdi's Risorgimento agenda in his operas was not recognised in its own time.

Incomplete Operas (review)

Reviewed by: Incomplete Operas Keith Cochran Hector Berlioz . Incomplete Operas. Edited by Ric Graebner and Paul Banks. Kassel: Bärenreiter, 2002. (New Edition of the Complete Works, 4.) (Musica Gallica.) [Gen. pref. in Eng., Fr., Ger., p. vii; foreword, p. viii–xxvi; score, 316 p. (includes facsims.); crit. notes, p. 317–26; facsims., p. 327–30; appendices, p. 331–45. Cloth. ISMN M-006-47144-7; Bärenreiter-Ausgabe 5444. €268.] Contains: Les francs-juges; La nonne sanglante. Like many composers in the nineteenth century, Hector Berlioz dreamed of having a successful operatic premiere in Paris. Although this goal eluded his three surviving operas—Benvenuto Cellini (1834–37), Les Troyens (1856–58), and Béatrice et Bénédict (1860–62)—we know that he contemplated other works throughout his career for theaters in Paris as well. Some of these works never got beyond the planning stage, others were begun but never finished, and one (Estelle et Némorin, 1823) was completed but then destroyed. Fragments of two of these unfinished compositions, Les francs-juges and La nonne sanglante, comprise the contents of this volume of incomplete operas edited by Ric Graebner and Paul Banks for the New Berlioz Edition; a third unfinished work, the intermède antique Érigone, appears in volume 21, Miscellaneous Works and Index, edited by Hugh Macdonald (2005). Written in 1825–26 to a libretto by Humbert Ferrand (1805–1868), Les francs-juges is, along with La révolution grecque (1825–26) and the recently discovered Messe solennelle (1824), the earliest of Berlioz's large-scale works to survive. The opera's plot, which deals with the secret Vehmic tribunals during the Middle Ages in Germany, reflects the contemporary interest in Gothic subject matter. Thanks in part to Berlioz's extensive correspondence and his Mémoires (Paris: Michel Lévy frères, 1870; ed. Pierre Citron, rev. ed. [Paris: Flammarion, 2000]; The Memoirs of Hector Berlioz, trans. and ed. David Cairns, rev. ed., Everyman's Library, 231 [New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002]), Graebner and Banks are able to provide a detailed account of the opera's original guise as well as subsequent revisions of both the libretto and music. Berlioz originally intended the three-act opera for a performance at the Théâtre de l'Odéon in late 1826, but when that possibility fell through, he presented three excerpts from it at a concert in May 1828. He revised and expanded the work twice, first in 1829–30 (with the new title Lenor, ou Les derniers francs-juges), then again in 1833–34 (reworked as a one-act intermezzo entitled Le cri de guerre du Brisgaw), each time for productions that failed to materialize. As late as 1853, Berlioz still hoped to salvage part of the work for concert use. Despite the opera's protracted genesis, Graebner and Banks have successfully identified which numbers date from the original composition and which were later additions. They draw in large measure on the work of D. Kern Holoman, who argued that the original version consisted of the overture and fourteen numbers (The Creative Process in the Autograph Musical Documents of Hector Berlioz, c. 1818–1840, Studies in Musicology, 7 [Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research [End Page 940] Press, 1980], 223). The extant numbers include the overture and nos. 1, 2, 6, 12, and 13 (which are complete); no. 7 (the trio pastorale "Le ciel et les voluptés") exists only in a piano-vocal score; and nos. 11 (Arnold's recitative and aria "Voici l'endroit fatal") and 14 (the finale) survive as fragments (a series of torn half-pages and stubs). The remaining numbers are lost, but Berlioz readily admitted in his memoirs that he incorporated parts of the opera into other works, a common practice with him. The editors have been able to trace some of these later adaptations. The Marche des gardes (no. 9) was revised and transferred to the Symphonie fantastique (1830) as the "Marche au supplice." A melody introduced in the opera's finale (No. 14) was later used in Benvenuto Cellini, and part of No. 11 became the second movement of the Grande symphonie funèbre et triomphale (1840). Most...

Electroacoustic adaptation as a mode of survival: arranging Giacinto Scelsi's Aitsi pour piano amplifée (1974) for piano and computer

Arrangement has always played an essential part of transmitting, preserving and disseminating works in the musical practice of both ‘high art’ and popular music. However, at present it is rarely practised in electroacoustic music, which can partly be explained by the nature of electronic technology and current thinking about authenticity. Despite this context, there are benefits to performance opportunities through the diversity created by arrangement; therefore, the process of adapting the electroacoustics of Scelsi's Aitsi is explored. The work offers this opportunity, since it lacks precision in its musical documentation, has received a number of quite different renditions and shows ontological malleability as it exists in another form, Scelsi's Fifth String Quartet. The new electroacoustic adaptation exploits Max/MSP software to extend the electroacoustic treatment of the piano beyond previous interpretations, whilst attempting to remain consistent with the aesthetic of the work. The article aims to encourage the composition and adaptations of works that afford performers interpretative licence with the electroacoustics in order to promote the distinctive and evanescent nature of mixed acoustic-electroacoustic works in concert performance, and encourage its continuation through an evolving performing tradition.

Bibliotecas e investigación musical

Not a long time ago it was a little difficult to defend the high level of research needed by the librarian in charge of a music collection. There were not many libraries specialized on this subject. Nowadays we have seen in Spain the revaluation of the collections of music schools, art academies, etc. and we count with several musical documentation centres specialized in a composer or a geographic area. There are also an old international project recently established in Spain, the RISM (Repertoire International des Sources Musicales), and others national plans working now, like Musica Inedita, of the Royal Palace library, or Instrumenta Musicae, directed by the National Library of Spain, that collects the information of musical documents of the 19th century kept in the national libraries of Spain and Latin America. A correct description of musical documents demands the use of reference works and bibliographic tools about composers, writers, title names, publishers or dates of publication. The result, condensed in a bibliographic record, normally brief, must be reliable in all his parts.

Authority Control in the Field of Music: Names and Titles

SUMMARY Music is a global and independent language: its main feature is being performed and disseminated far beyond national boundaries. The cataloguing process takes into account all kinds of documents preserving music and information about musical events: printed and manuscript music, sound recordings, librettos and concert programs, music periodicals, and books on music. International repertories, reference tools, and standards were developed by the mid-20th century. Authority control for music materials focuses on two different groups of problems: common access points like names have to fulfil specific needs, and terms identifying and giving access to the musical content, such as the uniform title, have to be introduced and controlled. Several issues concerning names need to be faced, varying from the different writings of the same name, to transliteration, to attribution and disambiguation. Specific issues concern music materials: access through generic titles such as “sonata” is often frustrating. There is thus the need to create controlled access points through content-related data such as medium of performance, musical form, thematic catalogue number, and music incipit. Since 1951, the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Music Documentation Centres has faced issues of authority control by promoting the publication of an international cataloguing code, through specific working groups (on the structure for uniform titles, on UNIMARC, on the exchange of authority data, and on indexing of music performances), and through international cataloguing projects.

Notes: A Sixtieth Birthday Retrospective

Forty years ago, the late Frank Campbell, editor of Notes, needed an essay celebrating the journal's first twenty years. These were dark days for both the association and its journal: funds were short, and the vision was strong but not confident. Implicit in my assignment was the case for the journal to continue. (1) My sequel twenty years later reflected a happier time: (2) the journal was still highly respected, but the crisis that lay behind the 1962 essay had passed. For the present third essay, the news is still good: if there is a crisis at all, it is partly caused by success. (3) The editorial practices have been worked out, and special features have been added, removed, revised, or deleted in orderly and convincing fashion. The turnover in editorial staff has been continuous and inconspicuous (editorial staff are recognized in table 1 (4)). The page count put on weight, then went on a diet. Advertisers, knowing that Notes readers come to remember their names and look for their new titles, have remained steady in their support. While other timely features (as listed in table 2) have served the special needs of many readers, it is the articles and reviews that have characterized the journal. Back in 1962 I proposed that the setting in the music world, which makes up the community of readers in the music library, was solid; but that the setting in the library world, which provides the administrative context for the music library, needed attention. In 1982 I thought the reverse was true. For this third retrospective, are there problems? Reviewing the contents of the last twenty years, and in the light of changes in the music world of today, there probably are, although they are hard to define, let alone address. Music librarians are well aware of them, and Notes is part of the answer, at least to the extent that the problem has a solution. Few of us expect things twenty years from now to be propitious in quite the same way as they are now. Both the music world and the library world continue to spin out of control. (So what is new?) The one has seen a proliferation of writings, kinds of interests, and communities of knowledgeable readers. The other has seen a proliferation of practices for addressing technical library practices. (The music library was such a safe and happy place in the 1950s: say this to the old-timers and watch them laugh!) Other professional organizations have also proliferated, and caught the eyes of music librarians. In music, the American Musicological Society (AMS) is still the next-door neighbor, partly because its members are our most numerous and supportive readers and contributors. But the Society for American Music (SAM), formerly the Sonneck Society, reflects a long-standing special interest of music libraries. Other music groups--the College Music Society (CMS), the Society for Ethnomusicology (SEM), and International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM) most notably, and many other delimited groups--are in the wings. In the library world, the American Library Association (ALA, as well as its components like ACRL and PLA) has been the obvious counterpart to AMS, but its primacy is being shared with the American Society for Information Science (ASIS). Music librarians today, furthermore, often find their kindred spirits in the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives, and Documentation Centres (IAML), or the Music OCLC Users Group (MOUG), the Association of Recorded Sound Collections (ARSC), or even the Art Library Association of North America (ARLIS-NA). The litany of acronyms makes it clear: while Notes has many good neighbors, it lives in its own home. The articles in Notes--in the beginning usually two per issue, averaging about ten pages each--have been the most conspicuous section of the journal. (5) A survey of the essays, arranged by broad topics to provide a scanning list of sorts, will suggest the content of the journal: MLA Activities. …

International music directory, 2004/2005: v.1: Performed music, concert management and promotion agencies, teaching and instruction; v.2: Radio and television, music publishers, documentation and research, national music councils, associations and foundations, indexes

International music directory, 2004/2005: v.1: Performed music, concert management and promotion agencies, teaching and instruction; v.2: Radio and television, music publishers, documentation and research, national music councils, associations and foundations, indexes

Music in Puerto Rico: A Reader's Anthology (review)

Donald Thompson provides yet another valuable reference work on the music history of Puerto Rico, an endeavor in which he has made several major contributions over the last two decades. Music in Puerto Rico: A Reader's Anthology is a compilation of historical and critical readings, translated into English, concerning Puerto Rican music and covering five centuries of musical documentation from 1495 to 1997. The musical traditions represented include aboriginal, traditional folk, popular—both urban and rural, and concert music. Given such wide chronological and thematic range, it is to be expected that this anthology does not aim to provide a thorough coverage of each historical period or each musical tradition. Instead, it offers an overview of Puerto Rico's rich musical life and a concise introduction of the subject for music students and scholars.

A Descriptive Study of Subject Indexing and Abstracting in International Index of Music Periodicals, RILM Abstracts of Music Literature, and The Music Index Online

There are now three major online databases dedicated to current indexing of the literature of music: The Music Index (hereafter MI); RILM Abstracts of Music Literature (RILM); and International Index to Music Periodicals (IIMP). [1] The online version of MI provides citations, but not abstracts, for periodical literature in music going back to 1979, and is available both on CD-ROM and via the Internet. It is produced by Harmonie Park Press, which has published the print version of MI since 1949. The Web version was used in the present study. Chadwyck-Healey, after briefly marketing an earlier CD-ROM version of MI, launched its own music database, IIMP, in 1996. Now owned by Bell & Howell Information and Learning, IIMP, provides indexing and abstracts for music periodical literature since 1996 and is steadily adding citations (without abstracts) for pre-1996 literature. IIMP is available on CD-ROM and in two Web versions: a basic product with traditional citations and abstracts, and IIMP Full Text, which add s access to the full text of articles from over forty journals. Trial access to IIMP, Full Text was used for the present study, though no use was made of the full-text options. RILM is a joint project of the International Musicological Society and the International Association of Music Libraries, Archives, and Documentation Centers. Since 1967, it has published abstracts of the whole range of scholarly literature in music, going beyond journal articles to include books, dissertations, catalogs, Festschriften, conference proceedings, and other formats. RILM exists in two electronic versions: it is available on CD-ROM and via the Web from National Information Services Corporation (NISC USA), and Web access is also provided through OCLC FirstSearch. The OCLC product was the primary means of access for the present study, though trial access to the NISC product was arranged for comparison of a few points. These three databases differ greatly in the ways in which they index the literature. The present study identifies a group of articles that have been treated by all three databases and compares those treatments in both quantitative and qualitative terms. [2] The quantitative section involved randomly selecting a large group of articles and comparing the number of subjects assigned, total words in the subjects, and unique words in the subjects in each of the three databases, and the number of words in the abstracts in RILM and IIMP. The qualitative aspect required looking more closely at a smaller number of items to compare the appropriateness of subjects chosen for indexing, the content and style of abstracts (for IIMP and RILM), and the accessibility of vocabulary in both. A search of the library literature found no studies comparing both indexing and abstracting of the same articles by different databases. Though many articles can be found comparing various utilities' coverage of particular topics or journals, very few actually examine subject access at the individual record level. MaryEllen C. Sievert and Alison F. Verbeck [3] come closest with a document-level comparison of subject indexing of the literature of online searching in Library and Information Science Abstracts and the education database ERIC, but their study did not include comparison of abstracts. QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS In order to carry out the comparisons envisioned for this study, it was necessary to generate a group of articles for which full treatment could be found in all three databases. This study was meant to be descriptive rather than predictive, and care was taken to make the sample generation process as objective as possible. The sample was limited to articles from 1996 in order to eliminate pre-1996 citation-only records in IIMP and post-1996 brief records added to RILM as part of its current citations project. A list was created of ninety-eight journals which each of the three databases claimed to index comprehensively. …