Before the dawn of the Third Reich, Jewish scholar Hugo Leichtentritt encountered three fellow musicologists: Oscar Sonneck, Carl Engel, and Harold Spivacke. Each of these men would assume the role of Chief of the Music Division of the Library of Congress and be instrumental to the preservation of the oeuvres of international artists, including Leichtentritt.
Meet three members of the Seeger Family—Charles Seeger, Ruth Crawford Seeger, and their daughter Peggy Seeger—through their music, writings, and correspondence in the newly described Seeger Family Collection. This wide-ranging and personal collection provides a number of avenues for research in folk and modern music, musicology, and family history.
The Erich Wolfgang Korngold Collection at the Library of Congress contains correspondence, the majority of which is addressed to Luzi Korngold, Erich's wife, and provides insight into her work as a published author, Erich's assistant, and her close relationships with her extended family.
Columnist Burt Boyar spent much of his life documenting the annals of Sammy Davis, Jr., a generational tour de force who surmounted extraordinary odds with his prodigious talent.
The Alex North Papers document the career of American film composer Alex North and are now processed for researchers to consult in the Performing Arts Reading Room of the Library of Congress.
The following is a guest post from Senior Music Specialist Loras Schissel. In 1930, John Philip Sousa set down his memories of playing in the first violin section in a special grand orchestra assembled for the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia during the summer of 1876. The conductor of this orchestra was the celebrated composer Jacques …
Recently, the Music Division completed the processing of the Chet Baker Materials. During this anniversary month of his passing, we remember the life of the artist whose name will forever be synonymous with West Coast Jazz.
Independent scholar Bonnie H. Miller discusses how she conducted research in the Library of Congress Performing Arts Reading Room for her book, "August Browne: Composer and Woman of Letters in Nineteenth-Century America."
On April 2, 2020, academia lost Claudio Spies, a beloved music scholar, conductor, composer and author whose pedagogical wisdom will continue to inspire students for generations to come. The Library of Congress is home to the Claudio Spies Papers.
