[Fwd: [SEM-L] New website, and discussion of ethnomusicologists and collectors]

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Dear Friends:

I am very pleased to announce the launch of my site, www.sephardicmusic.org.
The site chronicles the first 100 years of commercial Sephardic recordings.
It includes survey articles on the 78 and modern eras, a comprehensive
discography of Sephardic 78s, and a sample of what a proposed discography of
modern-era recordings could look like. I have tried to take advantage of the web's multimedia capabilities to
expand well beyond the normal contents of a discography (artist, title,
place and date recorded, etc.) Wherever possible, I include label graphics
and sound samples. A Union Catalog feature shows which public institutions
own a particular recording, and I have normalized the songs' titles so that
users can find all versions of any given song. Last, I have included
information on the labels that published these recordings, the artists that
made them, and the stores that sold them. I would welcome your comments. While preparing this site over the past decade, I have seen many times that
ethnomusicologists are not always aware of the depth of knowledge in the
record collecting community. Virtually all 78s have what are called "matrix
numbers" etched into the shellac, between the last few grooves and the
label. These numbers were entered into company studio logs when the songs
were recorded. It's possible to tap into a worldwide network of collectors
and researchers with expertise in different labels. For well-studied labels
such as Gramophone, these researchers are often then able to explain where
and when a given recording was mastered. Among other benefits, this lets
scholars trace the arc of a musician's career, examine repertory choices,
etc. Further, with more and more collectors digitizing their titles, I think
there is a great opportunity for hosting vernacular 78s on the Web. Instead
of satisfying ourselves with a limited diet of CD re-releases, we can now
contemplate the prospects of access to the majority of the releases. (While
I am no lawyer, Canadian and European releases of traditional songs on 78
should all be in the public domain by now.) I will be glad to explore the possibilities in this discussion thread, as
well as in person at the SEM conference, where I'm currently planning to
attend for a day. Very best,

Joel Bresler Sephardicmusic.org
Joel Bresler, Publisher
250 E. Emerson Road
Lexington, MA 02420
United States

www.sephardicmusic.org
1-781-862-4104 (Telephone & FAX)
joel.br@...
IN CASE OF VERIZON EMAIL PROBLEMS, PLEASE USE MY BACK-UP EMAIL:
joelbresler-at-gmail.com

--

/^_,',',',_ //^ /Kraig Grady_ ^_,',',',_
Mesotonal Music from:
_'''''''_ ^North/Western Hemisphere: North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/>

_'''''''_ ^South/Eastern Hemisphere:
Austronesian Outpost of Anaphoria <http://anaphoriasouth.blogspot.com/>

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