To search efficiently in the Music Department Library catalog, it helps to have a basic understanding of how sound recordings are cataloged.

If there is a single composition on a recording, the cataloging is relatively straight forward.

The MAIN ENTRY contains composer’s name or the name of ensembles.

UNIFORM TITLES are a standard title format agreed on and established by the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, 2nd ed.

Their form exists independently of the way a composition is listed on a CD or recording cover.

They were initially devised so that all the copies of one piece would be grouped together in a card catalog regardless of language variation in titles.

In Uniform Titles generic forms are always plural. For example, [Symphonies], is the UT for a recording of all Beethoven’s symphonies and [Symphonies, no. 5, op. 67, C minor.], is a recording of Beethoven’s fifth symphony.

Collections of a composer’s complete works have the UT [Works]. Collections of large portions of a composer’s works can have a UT based on what it actually is: [Orchestra music. Selections.].
The TITLE contains the recording title, the way it appears on the cover.

The DESCRIPTION gives the technical information regarding the format and media use for the recording.
If the recording is part of a SERIES the series name and the volume number of the item are given here.

The PUBLISHER NUMBER is the recording company’s number for this recording.

In the NOTES field, expanded information about the recording is usually found. A more detailed description of the piece or pieces, the contents of the recording, performer names, duration of pieces, date of the recording and any other information the cataloger deems important.

SUBJECTS contains subject headings for the recording contents based on the Library of Congress Subject Headings for music.

Unfortunately there is no online list of music subject headings. A Google search for “music subject headings” will provide substantial information, should you wish to use these headings as a search mechanism.

OTHER ENTRIES are listings, in main entry format, for other compositions on the same recording as well as performers, librettists and ensembles.

Search Tips

Searching this catalog consists is done by entering up to three terms that will be searched across all the fields in the catalog.

Sound recordings are cataloged with the first composition listed as the main entry and title. For example, if the main entry on a recording is mozart and the title entry is “symphony no. 40″, but the recording also contains beethoven “symphony no. 3″, a search for the beethoven will be successful even though it is not the first piece on the recording.

The three search term format allows for a increasingly refined search.

Here are some examples:

Term 1: beethoven
Will find all records containing beethoven.

Term 1: beethoven 
Term 2: sonatas
Will find all records for Beethoven Sonatas.

Term 1: beethoven
Term 2: sonatas  
Term 3: brendel
A more refined search that will find Beethoven Sonatas performed by Brendel.

Consecutive terms in quotes are searched as one term

Term 1: britten
Term 2: “peter grimes” 
Notice the quotes to find two words as one term.

Example: To find Fischer-Dieskau enter “fischer-dieskau”
Hyphenated words or names should also be surrounded by quotes.
They are searched as two words:

Search Notes

Use an asterisk “*” as a wildcard symbol.

For example, symph* will find:

symphony
symphonies
symphonie
symphonic

To search for a term containing an apostrophe, precede the apostrophe with a back slash as in the following examples:

To find O’Dette enter o\’dette
To find bug’s enter bug\’s