Top of page
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Midori, a classical violinist, made her debut with the New York Philharmonic at age 11. She plays the 1734 Guarnerius del Gesu "ex-Huberman."
Posted in: Asian American, LCM, Music, Performing Arts, Uncategorized
Posted by: Neely Tucker
It is midafternoon on a recent weekday and jazz legend Wynton Marsalis is driving across the Southwest, taking the call on speakerphone that his 1985 album, “Black Codes (From the Underground),” has been inducted into the 2023 class of the National Recording Registry. With endless desert spreading about behind and before him, he took a few minutes to talk about the album and its pointed political statement.
Posted in: Music, National Recording Registry, News, Performing Arts, Uncategorized
Posted by: Neely Tucker
The 2023 class of the National Recording Registry adds music from Mariah Carey, Queen Latifah, Daddy Yankee, the Eurythmics, Jimmy Buffett, Wynton Marsalis, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Ellen Taaffe Zwilich and several others. The 25 additions range from 1908 to 2012 and includes early blues and Mariachi music, along with radio broadcasts from the 1930s. A highlights video, with interviews with several of the artists, is included.
Posted in: Christmas, Music, National Recording Registry, Performing Arts, Video
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
Michael Stratmoen is a program specialist for the John W. Kluge Center. In this question-and-answer, he talks about growing up in D.C. and working with the Kluge Center's scholars and their projects.
Posted in: Copyright, Events, Gazette, Kluge Center, LGBTQ, Library Work and Employees, My Job, Washington DC
Posted by: Neely Tucker
To celebrate the start of the 2023 season, the Library is pleased to announce a new digital collection: Early Baseball Publications. The collection, which will grow over time, provides online access to more than 120 early baseball publications.
Posted in: Baseball, Collections, LC Web site
Posted by: Neely Tucker
Mark Dimunation has displayed his love for rare books in print, onstage and on television since he was appointed chief of the Rare Book and Special Collections Division at the Library — the largest collection of rare books in North America — a quarter of a century ago, in 1998. He retires this week, telling stories about great books and great personalities he's come across during his tenure.
Posted in: Curators, Library Work and Employees, Rare Book and Special Collections
Posted by: Mark Hartsell
Carol Lynn Ward Bamford curates the Library's collections of more than 2,000 musical instruments, including the James Madison crystal flute that Lizzo played at a concert last fall, setting social media afire.
Posted in: Concerts, LCM, Library Work and Employees, Music, My Job, Preservation and Conservation
Posted by: Mark Hartsell
Lizzo set the social media world afire last fall by playing, in concert, a short solo on a rare crystal flute that once belonged to President James Madison. The flute is one of the Library's most prized musical instruments and a showpiece of the collection of Dayton C. Miller, the famed physicist, astronomer and major flute aficionado. The collection, preserved in a vault at the Library, is not just the world’s largest of flute-related material, it is perhaps the largest collection on a single music subject ever assembled — and it’s what drew Lizzo to the Library in the first place.
Posted in: LCM, Library Work and Employees, Music, Performing Arts, Preservation, Science, Technology
Posted by: Wendi Maloney
The Library wrapped up its tribute to Joni Mitchell on a high note last week with a conversation between the 2023 Gershwin Prize winner and Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. In an exchange punctuated by laughter and ending in song, Mitchell detailed her unexpected evolution as a musical pathbreaker. The article contains a link to a video of the conversation.
Posted in: Concerts, Events, Gazette, Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, Music, Performing Arts, Women's History