96 years ago, before there was an International Women's Day

Whittaker is sorting through a donation, and encountered Rev H. R. Haweis' book, Music and Morals.  Intrigued, we glanced at the contents page.  The heading, 'People who play the piano' looked interesting.  Are pianists more or less moral than other folk?

"Most young ladies play the piano as an accomplishment.  A girl's education is as much based on the pianoforte as a boy's is on the Latin grammar, and too often with similar results." [...] " ... the piano makes a girl sit upright and pay attention to details ..."

 No, it's not being added to stock.  Good to know that times have changed a bit, though! See my earlier posting, today.

Portfolio Careers (article spotted in the Guardian this week)

This came up via the Culture Professionals Network:-

"Portfolio careers in the arts: one part pain, two parts pleasure

"Can the sum of your jobs make up more than the whole?
Rachel Nelken weighs up the pros and cons of portfolio working" Read the article here.

 

Join the Guardian Culture Professionals Network to be advised of interesting articles, events, etc. 

The Musical Times has a blog!

'Whittaker' discovered this link whilst checking a bibliographical detail ...

http://themusicaltimes.blogspot.co.uk/

 

Of course, staff and students at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland can also consult back copies of Musical Times on JSTOR.

International Women's Day in the Performing Arts

'Whittaker', being a performing arts library, wishes to commemorate International Women's Day as it particularly affects the performing arts.  Do share any relevant links with us!

Here's the first - on the UN Women website, we find the One Woman Song.

Glasgow Women's Library is up early today with a blogpost by Magi.  (Not, admittedly, performing arts, but certainly women and libraries.)

The Musicians' Union posts details of the Women of the World music festival on Sunday 9th March, here.

Have you come across Women in Music? It's a national organisation: http://www.womeninmusic.org.uk/

There's also an International Alliance for Women in Music: 
http://iawm.org/




If you tweet, you might like to follow the #EverydaySexism hashtag, a project which was featured by the BBC a couple of days ago.

There's a London Concert for International Women's Day: the London Oriana Choir has a concert of music by women composers, at St Andrews Holborn tonight:-
http://www.londonoriana.com/current-season/

What's missing from this list?  Drama and theatre!  Please share any relevant links! 

India Today features TV star Toral Rasputra aka Anandi of Balika Vadhu, telling us what International Women's Day means to her. Read it here.

Meanwhile, Bollywood salutes the spirit of women, in the Indian Express today.  Here ...

At 9.45 pm on a Friday night, a good blogger doesn't just arbitrarily stop blogging.  Three cheers for the collective of researchers at the University of Sussex, who this evening notified me of their Reframing Activism blog.  Today they were highlighting the British Library's first oral history archive of the early days of feminism: Sisterhood and After.  Not content with one good blogpost today, they also hosted a guest blogpost by film-maker, actor and musician Jodi Nelson: Feminist Social Media Praxis. Jodi was asked a provocative question: "re_activism:What do you think the 21st century feminist looks likes?"

 

Gaelic names of Pibrochs : Concise Dictionary edited by Roderick D. Cannon

Gaelic names of pibrochs: Concise Dictionary

A very useful resource - uploaded February 2013.  You'll find it here, on Ross Anderson's webpages.*

Now, there is also another document by Roderick Cannon, on the National Library of Scotland website.  Don't be confused - it looks the same, but it's not!  Headed, "Gaelic names of Piobearachds" online, the article is actually entitled 'Gaelic names of pibrochs' - just like the new concise dictionary.  Barnaby Brown says that it is 'a companion publication, very different', and advises us that the Concise Dictionary complements the classification article.  Here is the article.

* It's worth noting that Ross Anderson's website is extensive (to say the least); pipers will find a plethora of useful bagpipe information there, at www.piob.info. 

Accordina profiled in Box and Fiddle this month

Said to be favoured by jazz and trad musicians alike ... introducing ....

The Accordina

'Whittaker' had never heard of an Accordina before.  This is not the accordion, oh dear me no.

Find out more about this intriguing wind and free reed instrument on the Joseph Carrel website, or come and read Box and Fiddle for March 2013, where there's more about it, and details of a UK dealer.

Performing arts links for all!

In the past week, 'Whittaker' has shared performing arts links on a talk about

Tannahill (the Paisley songwriter); costume design; accordions; film music; a cover feature on Les Sirenes; and Signing music for the hearing impaired.

Read on!

http://whittakerlive.blogspot.com

Bibliolore blogs about film music

Bibliolore's latest blogpost is entitled, 

Random Film Accompaniment

Worth a look!

Les Sirenes Hit Headlines

Winning Choir of the Year, our own Les Sirenes - under the baton of Director Andrew Nunn - have made it onto the front cover of Choir and Organ magazine (March/April 2013), and there's an article about them on pages 68-70.

The latest issue is in the Whittaker Library - not available for loan yet, but do take a look next time you're in the Library!

Our thanks to Andrew for alerting us to this excellent article.

http://www.sirenes.co.uk/
Choir of the Year - Grand Final, on YouTube
Les Sirenes on Twitter

Fred Freeman - Recordings of Burns and Tannahill Songs

If you were at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland's Exchange Talk this evening, you may be keen to hear the recordings that Dr Fred Freeman was talking about.  It will have come as a surprise to many that Tannahill wrote songs with an Irish theme, as well as his many Scottish poems.

We have all three of his Tannahill recordings in the Whittaker Library - see here.


We also have his Robert Burns recordings - see here.

If you're interested in the old music publications that Fred referred to, we commend Geor Thomson's Scottish songbooks and R. A. Smith's Scotish Minstrel books, of which we have examples in our Special Collections.  See our catalogue!

oooooooooOOOOOOOOOOoooooooooo

Paisley poet weaver Robert Tannahill had a tragically short life, but his output made a huge impact. You can find a lot of digitised Tannahill material on Archive.org.

Another scholar who has worked on Tannahill's poetic contribution is Jim Ferguson, whose PhD at the University of Glasgow was a study of Tannahill's correspondence.  You can read this online, here:-

Ferguson, Jim (2011) - A weaver in wartime: a biographical study and the letters of Paisley weaver-poet Robert Tannahill (1774-1810). PhD thesis.

Signing concerts for the hearing impaired

The New York Times recently published a piece about signing for the hearing impaired, at the last night of the 2012 Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago. Read more here.

This is of particular interest to us, since we are strongly committed to working with hearing impaired people. The Conservatoire and Solar Bear Theatre Company have just appointed three deaf theatre apprentices - it's the first project of its kind in the UK and is funded through Creative Scotland’s Talent Hub.

19th Century Costume Design Website

Historical Sewing

Costume designers at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland might like to explore this website, offering instruction in designing and making 19th century costumes:-

http://historicalsewing.com/tutorials

Accordion Jokes From Bibliolore

Sorry, folks - these have to be shared!  

Bibliolore is the blog posted by a music bibliography service called RILM.  Genius with a light touch!

Online Trials of LGBT Videos

As we come to the end of LGBT month, the Whittaker Library is happy to announce that we have been kindly offered a trial access of the online resource, LGBT Studies in Video.

 

From today through 13th March 2013, all students, faculty, and staff may access LGBT Studies in Video here.  (NB, the trial is designed for on-campus use.)

"LGBT Studies in Video is a cinematic survey of the lives of lesbian, gay, transgender, and bisexual people and the cultural and political evolution of the LGBT community.  This first-of-its-kind collection features award-winning documentaries, interviews, archival footage, and select feature films exploring LGBT history, gay culture and subcultures, civil rights, marriage equality, LGBT families, AIDS, transgender issues, religious perspectives on homosexuality, global comparative experiences, and other topics.  The collection will have cross-disciplinary relevance beyond LGBT courses, serving research and teaching in different academic and performance fields.  The plan is to expand the collection to 500 hours in the not too distant future."

Please make use of this while we have access to it.  Do let Drama and Dance Librarian Alan Jones know what you think of it - you'll find his details on the Whittaker Library website.

Online Trials of Drama and Dance Resources

A Free In-House Trial for staff and students at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland - use it now and let us know what you think of it!

Theatre in Video

From today through 13th March 2013, all students  and staff may access Theatre in Video here.  (The trial can only be accessed on-site.)

"Theatre in Video contains hundreds of the world’s most important plays and video documentaries online in streaming video. For the first time, students, instructors, and researchers can bookmark specific scenes, monologues, and staging examples and then include those online links in their papers and course dissertations. Theatre In Video contains more than 250 definitive performances of the world's leading plays, together with more than 100 film documentaries, online in streaming video - more than 500 hours in all, representing hundreds of leading playwrights, actors and directors.
This release includes 265 videos, equalling approximately 338 hours."

Dance in Video

From today through 13th March 2013, all students, faculty, and staff may access Dance in Video here.

"Dance in Video is the definitive video collection for the study of 20th Century concert dance, featuring the most influential performers and companies together with dozens of documentaries, interviews, and dance instruction videos. The collection provides coverage in breadth and depth for modern dance forms, and is relevant to dance history, dance analysis, dance instruction.  It includes an overview of 20th Century concert dance, including the forerunners and pioneers of modern dance, covering ballet, tap, jazz, contemporary, experimental, and improvisation; an invaluable resource as dance is an inherently visual medium."

To get started, take a look at these custom playlists that feature samples of some of the great content included in this collection: Great Tappers, Partner dances, and CRWDSPCR.

These collections can be cross searched with all of our other video collections via video.alexanderstreet.com 

Now that you're connected, please let us know what you think about it.  Email Alan Jones, our Drama and Dance Librarian via the Library website.

Make use of it while it is there.

 

Online Trials of Music Resources

Alexander Street Press has offered staff and students of the Royal Conservatoire the opportunity to trial some of their other music offerings.  The Whittaker Library staff are keen to know what our readers think of them.  NB, The trial is designed for use on RCS premises, and links may not all work off-site.

From today until the 29^th March 2013 all staff and students can access:

Classical Music in Video here.

The videos in Classical Music in Video are cross-searchable with Alexander Street Press’s scores, reference works, and audio recordings.

"Classical Music in Video will be the definitive online collection for the study of classical music in video format. This collection contains performances of all forms of classical music, including major performances by leading orchestras, plus chamber music, oratorio, and solo performances, along with masterclasses and interviews with master teachers from around the world." 

Opera in Video here.

This collection can be cross searched with all of our other video collections via video.alexanderstreet.com

"Opera in Video is a comprehensive collection of operatic performances covering the most commonly studied operas in music history, opera literature, and performance classes. The collection contains hundreds of hours of video and is relevant to a broad range of studies, including music history, music appreciation, opera performance, analysis and theory."

Classical Scores Library: Vols. 1 and 2 here.

Please let us know what you think of these resources,

Catherine Small

Assistant Librarian – Music

Love Books? Some Places to Escape!

Drama Librarian Alan Jones shares this link with our readers :- 

The 30 Best Places to Be if You Love Books

Do you write poetry? Here's a competition!

Write a Poem: the Neil Gunn Competition

Yesterday evening, another librarian told me about this Scottish competition.  But you'll have to be quick - the closing date is this Friday!
 
It's the Neil Gunn Writing Competition.  Details here.
 
From the competition website:-

"The theme for both the adult prose and adult poetry sections is ‘The Tenderness of Stone’. [...]  Writers worldwide are invited to interpret this theme in any way they wish – the entries do not have to be set in Scotland or during the time when Neil Gunn himself was writing. Please see the entry rules for full details about the competition.

This biennial competition is organised by High Life Highland and The Neil Gunn Trust, who gratefully acknowledge the sponsorship of this year’s competition by Dingwall & Seaforth Ward 9, The Highland Council; Rhoda Michael, and David Lynch of The Greenhouse (www.thegreenhousedingwall.co.uk)[...]. We are delighted that the lead judge for this, the 13th competition is Scottish author Jackie Kay."*
 

*Whittaker Library patrons will recall Jackie Kay's memorable visit to the Library last year, when she gave readings from her books.

The Scots Language: Guest Blog by Wojciech Gardela

After blogging about Scots pronunciation, a few days ago, 'Whittaker' was offered further advice on the Scots language.  So much useful advice, in fact, that it merits a blogpost of its own. So here is a guest blogpost by Wojtek Gardela, Lecturer in Scots Language at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.

Pronunciation, Dictionaries and Online Resources

 

• The online Dictionary of the Scots Language (DSL) has pronunciations, depending on the region. They're in square brackets, but are not given for every word. 
• While using the DSL, you can also look up words using the SND + SND Supplement searches, as this will give pronunciations of words from 1700 onwards (i.e. Modern Scots), where such pronunciations are available. 
• There's ongoing work on a newer version of the DSL, but it only contains material for Older Scots (i.e. up to 1700).
• An alternative may be a paper copy of the Concise Scots Dictionary (CSD), which, as far as I remember, has more pronunciations.   (Here is our Whittaker Library copy in the catalogue.)
   
• You should remember, though, there are a number of non-linguistic dictionaries of Scots on the market, too (published under various names), but only those published by the Scottish Language Dictionaries are 'official' and most comprehensive, backed up by decades of evidence gathering by specialists in the field.
• There are more publications by the Scottish Language Dictionaries here: http://www.scotsdictionaries.org.uk/Publications/index.html
• Although I don't know of any books that would give International Phonetic Alphabet pronunciations of Scots words, info on IPA can be found here, if you're interested in phonetics:- http://www.langsci.ucl.ac.uk/ipa/index.html

There are also other websites, which are not dictionaries but may be helpful to those studying Scots song - see below.

Websites which may assist in studying Scots song

• http://www.abdn.ac.uk/elphinstone/kist/   The University of Aberdeen's Elphinstone Kist ("the official Doric site")
•  http://www.scotslanguage.com/  The Scots Language Centre: Centre for the Scots Leid (supporting the Scots language and Scots speakers online)

Lastly, Wojciech has recommended a new Scots language book - Modren Scots Grammar, by Christine Robinson. It was launched literally last week, and we're ordering a copy of it.  (If you have a Kindle, you can buy a copy in Kindle format at a lower price.)

Wojciech Gardela's own web-page

The Story of the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM)

ABRSM

by MusiCB3

 Here's a blogpost from the University of Cambridge, about the beginnings of ABRSM.