Special Collections in Music —An Alternate ApproachAuthor(s): Richard JonesSource: Fontes Artis Musicae, Vol. 29, No. 3 (Juli-September 1982), pp. 122-124Published by: International Association of Music Libraries, Archives, and Documentation Centres(IAML)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23505619 .

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122

Special Collections in Music -

An Alternate Approach Richard Jones (Milwaukee, Wisconsin)

One of the things which help both individuals and organizations to grow and to develop their abilities is the acceptance of challenges which may seem, at first glance, to be beyond the

capacities of the acceptor(s). Such a challenge was the acquisition, move, and organization of

the American Geographical Society Collection to the UWM Library.1 Another such task was

the organization and sponsorship of a national "Symposium on the University Library and the

Arts." These and other similar tasks and projects demonstrate the developing maturity of a

young but vital library on a campus of a university yet to reach its 25th year, and the commit

ment of its staff and administration to the needs of the scholarly world in general. It is paradoxical, then, that persons and institutions can demonstrate that same maturity by

following exactly the opposite course — by admitting that we cannot do everything, that other

persons or institutions can do certain things better than we, by placing the needs of scholarship in general ahead of our own parochial needs and personal prestige. A fine example of such ac

tion is demonstrated by a unique co-operative venture developed and implemented by the

Golda Meir Library3 and the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University. In 1965, Dr. John Dale Owen, a Milwaukee pediatrician and jazz-buff who was planning to

move to New Mexico on his retirement, offered his collection of 78 r.p.m. jazz recordings to

the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. This collection of some 10,000 discs was, at the time, one of the finest and largest such collections in either private or public hands. It included not

only a large and comprehensive selection of commercial recordings from the early '30's

through the early '50's, but also a large number of private transcriptions and V-discs. (V-discs were special recordings made by the great stars of the '40's for the Armed Forces during World War II; they were never available for general distribution and many were destroyed in 1949.)

During the past fourteen years, this collection was moved from one administrative unit within the University to another as the Department of Music, the School of Fine Arts, the

University Administration, the Chancellor's Office, and finally the Library attempted to find a proper home and use for the collection - one which would reflect its importance and histori

cal value - and to develop means for proper maintenance and organization for the recordings which would make them equally accessible to students, faculty, scholars, and jazz-buffs everywhere. Such a collection, however, requires a sizeable commitment of staff, monies, facilities, and equipment to fulfill the twin demands of maintenance and public accessibility. During these fourteen years, many attempts were made to find the resources; the demands of a growing institution and of fulfilling our commitments to established programs, however, doomed the attempts to failure.

These same fourteen years saw another important development in the general world of musical scholarship, namely the legitimization of jazz as a discipline for study and research.

During this time several institutions were created which specialized in this field of work,

developing the techniques and procedures for collecting, handling, maintaining, organizing, and making accessible such collections. Unlike rare and old books, rare recordings are impor tant because of their aural content, not specifically because of the age of the physical item; nonetheless, the original disc also remains an object of historical interest and it is important to store and maintain such collections in ways that preserve the physical unit while making the aural content available for general use with as much fidelity and clarity as is possible. Organi

1 The problems encountered in implementing this move, believed to have been the largest collection move in the his tory of American librarianship, is described in Current Geographical Publications. 2 The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee was founded in 1956 with an original enrollment of 6,100. The current enroll ment is 25,000 in a variety of undergraduate, master's level and doctoral level programs. 3 In August 1979, the Library at UWM was dedicated to the memory of Golda Meir, former Prime Minister of Israel and a student at one of UWM's predecessor institutions.

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Richard Jones: Special Collections in Music 123

zations such as the Hogan Jazz Archives at Tulane University, the historical recordings collec

tions at the Library of Congress and the Smithsonian Institution, the Berkeley School of

Music Library, and the Institute of Jazz Studies at Rutgers University are now among the lead

ers in this field and have collections which are equal to or greater than the Owen Collection in

terms of both size and quality. Other institutions, of course, have smaller collections, many of

which — like the Owen Collection — are limited in availability and public awareness.

After a two year study of the Owen Collection which focused on the importance of the col

lection and possible methods of implementing public accessibility, the UWM Library adminis

tration authorized exploratory contacts with one of these major jazz institutes to determine

the feasibility of developing the collection's potential through a co-operative venture. The In

stitute of Jazz Studies (IJS) was chosen as the first organization to contact for many reasons.

The IJS was founded by Marshall Stearns, a leading jazz scholar, in 1952. The Institute's

board selected Rutgers University as its permanent home in 1966, and the collection, based on

Dr. Stearns' own collection, was donated to Rutgers in that year, not long before Dr. Stearns'

death. The Institute, located in Newark, New Jersey, is one of the leading jazz research or

ganizations in the world. Its collections include over 50,000 phonograph records; numerous

tapes, cylinders, and piano rolls; 3,000 books; extensive holdings in jazz periodicals; exhaus

tive research files; films, videotapes, memorabilia, and sheet music; and a collection of an

tique phonographs. The National Endowment for the Humanities recently awarded IJS a

major grant to develop, in co-operation with the Library of Congress and the Online Comput er Library Center (OCLC), a computer-based catalog of its collections which would set jazz

cataloging standards for the entire country. All libraries using the OCLC co-operative system

(including UWM) have access to the authoritative, comprehensive cataloging done by IJS

and, in addition, IJS now distributes, free of charge, microfiche copies of the printed catalog. Thus, in addition to providing a standard for jazz cataloging, the Institute also provides exten

sive public awareness of the materials in its colléctions. In addition IJS provides research

facilities for scholars and students of jazz from all over the world, makes transcriptions of rare

and historical recordings for scholarly and teaching purposes, and publishes the only scholarly

English-language jazz periodical, the Journal of Jazz Studies.

Preliminary contacts with Dan Morgenstern, Director of IJS, were made in early May 1979.

By late June, a tentative agreement, subject to an inspection of the collection, was reached. In

early August, Ed Berger, Assistant Director of the Institute, arrived at UWM to determine

the condition of the collection and to confer with Mr. William Roselle, Director of the Golda

Meir Library, Mr. William Moritz, Associate Director, and Mr. Richard Jones, Music Librar

ian. After some formal procedures were discussed, the conditions of an agreement were for

malized. The move was completed in May 1980 after extensive ceremonies in Milwaukee and

Newark. Thanks to some very special packing and handling, the collection arrived exactly as it

left Milwaukee.

The agreement encompasses the following points: (1) UWM retains ownership of the col

lection which will be maintained or marked in such a way that, should UWM ever wish to have

it back, it can be reassembled intact; (2) if the Institute of Jazz Studies should cease to function

as presently constituted, the Owen Collection will be returned to UWM; (3) the Institute will

maintain, organize, catalog, publicize, and provide public access to the Collection; (4) UWM

cannot foresee the need for the collection to be returned and considers this move a "perma nent loan;" and (5) if UWM requires individual items from the Collection, IJS will provide cassette transcriptions free of charge.

This arrangement will be of benefit to UWM and the University of Wisconsin System, to the

Institute, and to the world of music and scholarship in general. UWM and the State of Wiscon

sin have lost nothing - the Owen Collection remains our property. We gain, however, in that

the Collection will for the first time be available to our students and Faculty: it will be arranged so that specific items can be identified and located, maintained so that none of its historical or

aural value will diminish, cataloged so that we can know what items are in it, and available in a

format (cassette, or other, if new formats become accepted generally) which can be used here

without damaging the original item. In addition, UWM gains the prestige of having put its own

local "pride of ownership" behind its commitment to the needs of scholars in general.

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124 Richard Jones: Special Collections in Music

The Institute of Jazz Studies gains similarly by this agreement. The Owen Collection will

form a major and valuable addition to its collections and will provide a broader base for the re

search and study aspects of the work done at IJS. Already an important research library, by the addition of this collection IJS becomes even more significant. The Institute also adds to its

renown as an organization which is willing to accommodate the needs of co-operation with

other organizations to the benefit of the world of scholarship.

Finally, the musical and scholarly worlds have gained access to a very important resource in

the history of jazz, one which is now to be located in the same place as an even larger collec

tion. Scholars and students of jazz will not have to write or travel to two different places, to

satisfy two different sets of regulations and rules, to deal with two different arrangements and

organizations of collections, to waste valuable time and energy while doing their research.

Different versions, performances and/or "takes" of the same work can be compared easily:

side-by-side, in effect. In short, the loan of this collection to IJS by UWM provides a great benefit to musical scholars and jazz buffs, while simultaneously providing an increase in the

value of both the IJS and the UWM collections.

Finally, one must note that this agreement provides a model for other libraries and organi zations which wish to fulfill their commitments to scholarship and research while filling the de

mands of their own patrons. Many libraries have similar collections of books, manuscripts,

papers, recordings, etc. in many different disciplines and fields which are limited in their ac

cessibility by lack of organization, staff, money, expertise, and/or public awareness. Unfortu

nately, many times a sense of "ownership" of these collections overwhelms the librarians'

sense of scholarly commitment. In these days of limited budgets and resources, librarians

speak more and more of the advantages of and need for "co-operative development" of the re

sources needed to develop our commitments to our own institutions and to the scholarly world

in general. This agreement provides a pattern for one type of such co-operation which it would

behoove other libraries and librarians to consider.

L'Université de Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) et l'Institut des études de jazz à l'Université Rutgers (Newark, N.J.) (IJS) ont conclu un accord de coopération en vue du développement de leurs principales ressources dans la documentation de la musique de jazz. La collection John Dale Owen, un groupe de plus de 10.000 disques, incluant beaucoup de pressages d'essai, transcriptions privées, prises non commer cialisées, enregistrements privés aussi bien que du commerce, a été donnée par son propriétaire à UWM en 1965. Selon cet accord, complété et signé en mai 1980, UWM conserve la propriété de la collection tan dis que US en reçoit la possession matérielle et se charge de sa conservation et de son catalogage. UWM recevra des copies sur bande de tout ce qui sera demandé par ses dirigeants, alors que IJS recueille la bé néfice de ce nouvel enrichissement à son importante collection. Ces deux institutions bénéficient d'un ac croissement auquel elles ne pouvaient prétendre seules. Les plus grands bénéfices, cependant, vont au monde musical et savant qui a maintenant accès à ces grandes et importantes ressources dans un seul lieu et avec une documentation spécialisée. Cet accord peut servir de modèle pour le développement de semblables collections d'archives.

Die Universität von Wisconsin-Milwaukee und das Institut für Jazz-Studien an der Rutgers Universität (Newark, N.J.) haben ein ungewöhnliches, kooperatives Abkommen getroffen, um eine wichtige Hilfsquelle zur Dokumentation der Jazz-Musik zu erschließen. 1965 schenkte John Dale Owen der UWM seine Sammlung von mehr als 10000 Jazz-Platten, die sowohl viele Versuchspressungen, private Über tragungen, unveröffentlichte Aufnahmen und „V"-Platten als auch im Handel befindliche Platten ent hält. Gemäß dem im Mai 1980 abgeschlossenen und unterschriebenen Abkommen behält die UWM das Besitzrecht der Sammlung, während das IJS für die Aufbewahrung, Erhaltung und vollständige Katalogisierung sorgt. Die UWM kann auf Verlangen von jedem Stück der Sammlung Tonbandkopien bekommen; das IJS hingegen hat seine schon bedeutende Sammlung um einen neuen wichtigen Zuwachs bereichert. Beide Institutionen profitieren somit in einem Ausmaß, das einer Institution allein nicht mög lich gewesen wäre. Den größten Vorteil hat jedoch die musikalische und wissenschaftliche Welt, die nun Zugang zu dieser wichtigen und bedeutenden, an einem Ort zusammengefaßten und fachlich dokumen tierten Sammlung hat. Dieses Abkommen könnte als Modell für das Zustandekommen ähnlicher Archiv Sammlungen dienen.

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