The Music Library and Its Collections

The Music Library is one of the largest collections of its kind at a public university, and is currently ranked among the top ten music libraries in the United States. Its collections contain more than 765,000 volumes, including over 55,000 books, 520,000 scores, 19,000 microforms, 150,000 sound recordings, and over 20,000 items in other formats and media.  The library supports a wide range of advanced programs in the School of Music and collects materials within most fields of musical performance, music education, musicology, music theory, and composition. Music Library reference tools comprise the most extensive collection in the state outside of the Chicago area. Service is extended to a diverse clientele throughout the state and nation, as well as to numerous foreign scholars seeking to make use of the Music Library's rich and unique resources.

A Brief History

In 1944 the Library at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign had assembled a collection of some15,000 volumes of printed music and books in the general field of music. On February 16 of that year, a separate music library branch opened on the second floor of Smith Memorial Hall with a collection of 250 reserve items. For over thirty years the music collections and services spread throughout Smith with the circulation and listening services for sound recordings moving to the Undergraduate Library during the summer of 1969. In August 1974 the Music Library began consolidated operations in its present quarters in the north wing of the Music Building.

The Library Today

Musical scores and sound recordings, which together represent 90 percent of the collection, include vocal work (songs, choral music, operas, theater music, liturgical resources); instrumental works (music for solo instruments, orchestra scores and parts, chamber music); and many scholarly editions, including complete works sets of major composers as well as multi-volume monuments of music from various European countries and regions.

Special Collections

 Renaissance Music Manuscripts on Film
The Music Library holds the world's largest and most comprehensive collection of Renaissance polyphonic music microfilms in the world, forming the core of the distinguished Musicological Archives for Renaissance Manuscript Studies. 

 King Collection
The Lawrence King Collection, acquired in 1995, added over 50,000 recordings, video resources, scores, books on opera, photographs, and libretti to the rich holdings of the Music Library in this area. Special emphasis is given to nineteenth-century resources, among which are numerous published editions of French opera as well as libretti of several hundred Italian opera productions. 

 Fraenkel Collection
The Gottfried Fraenkel collection consists of about 900 published works of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European musicians, including first editions of major composers. 

 Joseffy, Szigeti, Rensch, and Rolland
The Music Library holds the personal libraries of several renown performers, including the pianist Rafael Joseffy (1852-1915), violinist Joseph Szigeti (1892-1973), harpist Roslyn Rensch, and over 1,000 editions of string music from the eminent violin teacher Paul Rolland (1911-1978). 

 Ethnomusicology
The library's ethnomusicology holdings support a doctoral-level program, including books and journals in English and foreign languages, a broad selection of folk-song collections and other printed music sources, videotapes, and approximately 7,000 Western and non-Western commercially-issued sound recordings.  

 Sheet Music
Among sheet music collections are about 100,000 titles of popular US music from the 1790s through the 1970s, approximately 700 Brazilian editions from the 1930s, other Latin American imprints, and numerous Western European resources.  Use the card catalog and online catalog to search.

 Russian Folk Music: Kasura and Kutin
The Music Library holds the personal music libraries of Walter J. Kasura (1919-1983), director of the Balalaika and Domra Society of New York, and Alexander Kutin (1899-1986), director of the Balalaika Symphonic Orchestra, also based in New York. These collections provide scores and/or parts for more than 23,000 works for Russian folk orchestra. Finding aid.

 Young Collection
The Music Library has a rich collection of American nineteenth-century printed music materials, including numerous song collections, sheet music editions, and related items from the Barnard A. and Morris N. Young Library of Early American Popular Music.

 WGN Orchestra
Among several collections of dance band and theater orchestra music is the WGN Collection of almost 3,000 items, used by professional musicians affiliated with the Chicago radio station during its pre-World War II years. 

 Partch and Gaburo
Special archival collections contain the music of composers Harry Partch, Kenneth Gaburo, and other individuals formerly affiliated with the University of Illinois School of Music. Partch finding aid. Other information on Partch and Gaburo.

 Eberhard Collection
This collection of the works of composer Dennis Eberhard (1943-2005) was donated by members of his family in summer 2005. Eberhard studied composition and musicology at UIUC during the late 1960s and early 1970s. An online finding aid is available.

 Many Strengths
Other special collection strengths include hymnology, eighteenth-century British music editions, and music education dissertations (over 7,000 titles from 1950 to the present on microfilm).