Do you want to learn how to play piano? We have a book for you! Do you want the libretto for your favorite opera? We have that as well! Do you want to learn about folk music from around the world? Well, we also have books about that. Many patrons get to know us through …
One would think the act of writing music would be enough of a task for most people, but with some composers, creativity is not enough. They enjoy a challenge, and some have an interest in letters and numbers and what they can do to arrange them into cryptograms. It’s a way to bury a message, …
A couple of weeks ago, one of my colleagues here at NLS, David Fernandez-Barrial, asked me if I had seen the Grammy award ceremony (which took place Monday, February 15, 2016). I had to admit I hadn’t; I was, uh, practicing my Hindemith songs. Well, it turns out that Stevie Wonder, one of the presenters at …
The following is a guest blog by Donna Koh, Music Reader Services Librarian in the Music Section. There are a few experiences in my life that I know I will never forget. One of them took place when I was 9 years old and living in Korea. One evening, my piano teacher called my …
As we are exiting the period that can still be referred to as “the new year” and are approaching the season of renewal known as spring, we’d like to highlight some of our recent publications, namely our new catalogs. Although we’ve had blog posts about magazines produced by the Music Section (Musical Mainstream and Contemporary …
Today we are honoring a superstar in opera. You know someone is famous when they are referred to by only one name; Michelangelo, Beethoven, Bach, Picasso. And that is just a short list of artists and composers. What about performers? Who can possibly be ingrained in the memory of fans to be remembered by one …
Over the past month, the Music Section has added more than 45 new braille, audio, and large-print music titles by roughly twenty-five different composers to its collection. Together, just three composers, Ludwig van Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, and Robert Schumann, wrote compositions that comprise nearly a quarter of the total amount of those additions. I thought it a good …
Dear Readers, This is the FOURTH post announcing a new set of braille scores that are free for the asking. There are more than 100 scores in the new spreadsheet list. As before, these are scores that have been received over the years as gifts from individuals, libraries and braille producers. They are duplicates of …
The following is a guest blog by Donna Koh, Music Reader Services Librarian This blog is for those classical music lovers who marvel at the beauty and versatility of the human voice but find many operas overdramatic, long and overwhelming. If I may make a confession, I am one of those music lovers. Fortunately for …
