Ten Tips for Research in Music
1. Start with Oxford Music Online, available through the library web site, under "Electronic Reference" or "Databases/Art, Music, & Theatre," for background information on topics in music. Consult the bibliographies attached to articles for resources to go to for more information. In addition, browse the encyclopedias and handbooks in hard copy in the reference collection, located on the 2nd floor. You will find books about music in the section with call numbers beginning with M. Reference books have to be used in the library.
2. Look for books to check out and read, books with more in-depth information, on the other floors of the library. The books about music, with call numbers that begin with M, are located on the 1st floor. To identify books, search ALiCat, the online catalog to Augie's book collection, by topic, author, or title. When you find yourself in the M section, browse the shelves to discover more books!
3. If you are searching for a phrase in ALiCat, such as "Louis Armstrong," you might put quotation marks around the phrase to get results that include only the musician Louis Armstrong.
4. If you don't find the particular book or group of books that you are looking for in ALiCat, search the I-Share catalog which is a consortium of academic libraries in Illinois. You can request these books to be delivered to Augustana, but first you have to set up an account for yourself with a user name and password.
5. For contemporary topics or more focused discussion on a topic, you will want to look for articles in periodicals, that is, magazines and journals. Some of the periodicals we subscribe to are in hard copy format and some are in electronic format. To search by topic in either format, search the library's databases found on the library web page under "Databases A-Z" or "Databases/Art, Music, & Theatre."
6. Academic Search Complete, JSTOR, and RILM are three databases that provide access to articles in periodicals across the disciplines, including music. ASP provides access to popular magazines as well as scholarly journals. JSTOR provides access to the full text of archives of scholarly journals. RILM is a database that provides access to only music journals.
7. Important: When you find an article that you want to read and if a link to the full text of the article is not provided, go to Journals and Magazines on the library web page. Type in the journal title you are looking for (not the title of the article) and get a list of places where you can find the full text of the article.
8. If the full text of the article is not available through the Tredway Library, you can request a copy of the article through Interlibrary Loan. Ask a librarian for help. Articles are usually delivered to you in your email very quickly.
9. If you use the web, remember that not all websites are created equal. Make sure the site is reputable and authoritative. Some suggestions for portals to music on the web:
Worldwide Internet Music Resources from Indiana University:
http://library.music.indiana.edu/music_resources/
Recommended sites from Harvard:
http://hcl.harvard.edu/research/guides/onmusic/
10. ASK a research librarian for help. We wait for your questions at the research help desk across from the elevators on 2nd floor.
Page created by Rachel Weiss, updated June 2017.