Nearly 50 years ago today marked the beginning of the Monterey International Pop Festival, one of the first rock festivals in the United States. Nowadays, rock festivals are a common occurrence, happening in various locations year-round. Back in 1967, though, the rock festival was not common. Monterey helped change all that, as the rock festival …
Spring has sprung around these parts in Washington, DC, but for this blog post I am going to continue with our international theme and wax poetic about springtime in France. I’m bringing up this geographic location because two well-known French composers, Gabriel Fauré and Jules Massenet, share a birthday today, May 12! Although neither Fauré …
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 …
I hope everyone out there had a relaxing and peace-filled holiday season. Now that the year is almost through, it’s time to look ahead to 2016 and the new beginnings that await us there. In keeping with that spirit, this blog will highlight some of the newest braille and digital talking books that have been …
If you had ever been a music student, then you have no doubt come across the Norton Anthology of Western Music. This tome compiles the standard repertoire of Western art music presented in history, theory, and performance classes, and describes the music with historical notes and other contextual information. For some time, the Music Section …
Although the majority of the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped (NLS) Music Section’s collection deals with classical music, we also have a wide array of materials dedicated to the great American art form–jazz. In this blog post, I will detail some of the special format materials in our collection that jazz …