Sound recordings

Last Updated: 30-May-2015

This topic guide includes recommended print and online resources relating to the history of sound recording, discographies, periodicals / journals, and general reference publications relating to recorded sound.

Subject Librarians

Jonathan Manton

Sound Archives Librarian

Archive of Recorded Sound

(650) 725-8862

jmanton@stanford.edu

Subjects

Music

Sound recordings

Around Stanford

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Search for recordings
History of sound recording
General reference
Discographies
Periodicals / Journals

Search for recordings

The following resources can be used to search for sound recordings held at Stanford University Libraries.

Library catalog (Searchworks)

Searchworks includes information on sound recordings held by all Stanford University Libraries.

Finding aids (OAC)

Finding aids for many of the unique audio collections held at Stanford, by both the Archive of Recorded Sound and Special Collections, can be searched via the Online Archive of California (OAC).

WorldCat

Not all of the Stanford Archive of Recorded Sound's holdings are available in Searchworks or described in a finding aid. If you cant find what you are looking, try searching WorldCat for details of the item you require, being sure to note the record label and number (listed as Standard No. in WorldCat) in each instance. Then contact the Archive to check if the recording you need is in their collection.

Streaming audio databases

Stanford University Libraries provides access to a number of online streaming audio databases that include thousands of recordings.

History of sound recording

The following offer excellent overviews of the history of recorded sound. They examine the technological advances in sound recording, from its inception to today's digital environment; the sound recording industry; and finally the impact recorded sound has had on performance practice. A number of other resources have been published that go into greater detail about particular record labels, formats, or time periods, but the ones below are suggested as starting points as they cover the topic more broadly.

America on record : a history of recorded sound / Andre Millard.

2nd ed. Cambridge ; New York, NY : Cambridge University Press, 2005.

Archive of Recorded Sound » Stacks » ML1055 .M47 2005

The Cambridge companion to recorded music / edited by Nicholas Cook ... [et al.].

Cambridge, UK ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 2009.

Music Library » Stacks » ML1055 .C36 2009

Capturing sound : how technology has changed music / Mark Katz.

Rev. ed. Berkeley : University of California Press, c2010.

Music Library » Stacks » ML3790 .K277 2010

Listen to this / Alex Ross.

New and updated ed., 1st Picador ed. New York : Picador, 2011.

SAL3 (off-campus storage) » Stacks » ML3785 .R67 2011

Chapter 3 - Infernal machines: how recordings changed music (p. 55-68)

Perfecting sound forever : an aural history of recorded music / Greg Milner.

1st ed. New York : Faber and Faber, 2009.

Music Library » Stacks » ML3838 .M645 2009

Selling sounds : the commercial revolution in American music / David Suisman.

Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 2009.

Music Library » Stacks » ML3790 .S88 2009

Sound recording : the life story of a technology / David L. Morton, Jr.

Westport, CT : Greenwood Press, 2004.

Archive of Recorded Sound » Stacks » TK7881.4 .M674 2004

Vinyl : a history of the analogue record / Richard Osborne.

Farnham, Surrey ; Burlington, VT : Ashgate, c2012.

Archive of Recorded Sound » Stacks » ML3790 .O825 2012

Online

An Audio Timeline

Created by the Audio Engineering Society.

A brief history of recording to ca. 1950

Article on the developments in recorded sound during the first half of the 20th Century.

A Recorded Sound Timeline

Complied by the Library of Congress.

"Recording", The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, 2nd edition

Article on sound recording in The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, 2nd edition.

General reference

Encyclopedia of recorded sound / Frank Hoffmann, editor ; Howard Ferstler, technical editor.

2nd ed. New York : Routledge, 2005.

Archive of Recorded Sound » Reference (non-circulating) » ML102 .S67 E5 2005 V.1

Oxford music online [electronic resource].

[Oxford, England] : Oxford University Press

Stanford University Libraries » Online resource » (no call number)

Includes Grove Music Online, The Oxford Companion to Music, and The Oxford Dictionary of Music.

The world's encyclopaedia of recorded music, by Francis F. Clough and G. J. Cuming.

Westport, Conn., Greenwood Press [1970, c1966]

Archive of Recorded Sound » Reference (non-circulating) » ML156.2 .C647 1970

Also available as a PDF online.

Discographies

Online

Bielefelder Kataloge Klassik

Annually updated catalog of classical recordings published on LP, CD, and digital formats. Also available in print. Published in German. Translation is offered using Google Translate.

CHARM

The CHARM online discography includes much of The Gramophone Company's 78rpm output; 78s and some LP series from numerous other US, UK and other European companies including Columbia and Decca; and the World's Encyclopaedia of Recorded Music (WERM).

Encyclopedic Discography of Victor Recordings (EDVR)

This database provides an index to master recordings (matrixes) and published discs made by the Victor Talking Machine Company beginning in 1900. Approximately 1,000 new master recordings are added to the database monthly and the resource will eventually extend to the end of the 78rpm era in the early 1950s. Users can also listen to recordings from more than 10,000 takes listed in the discography.

The Jazz Discography

This is the most comprehensive, general jazz discography in existence. It includes information on over 183,000 jazz recording sessions from 1896 to the present. Information for each session includes personnel, place and date of recording, song titles, matrix numbers, and issue (catalog) numbers for a variety of formats, from 78 rpm discs to CDs and downloads. Listings are updated on a daily basis.

The Online (78rpm) Discographical Project

This resource focuses on numerical listings of 78rpm records, cylinders, and radio transcriptions. This regularly updated project eventually aims to list the catalog number, artist, title, matrix number, cross-references, location, recording date, and composer of every commercially released recording in the 78rpm era.

Praguefrank's Country Music Discographies

A comprehensive set of discographies of country music and crossover since 1920.

Shaded Dog

A discography of RCA Victor's famous Living Stereo classical records.

Ted Staunton's 78 rpm label gallery

A regularly updated image gallery of 78rpm disc labels, arranged by decade and country of release.

Print

The Archive of Recorded Sound holds the majority of discographies ever committed to print. Each publication presents inventories of recordings, commonly arranged either by record label, artist, genre, or time period.

› See all 750 results

Calypso and other music of Trinidad, 1912-1962 : an annotated discography

compiled by Craig Martin Gibbs. 2015
Classical recordings

Sam Jackson. 2015
Beats to the rhyme : a collection of instrumental hip-hop records for the beat connoisseur

Albert D. Patterson. 2014
Bell and Arto Records : a history and discography, 1920-1928

William R. Bryant ; with the Record Research Associates ; edited and annotated by Allan Sutton. 2014
Eli Oberstein's United States Record Corporation : a history and discography, 1939-1940

Allan Sutton and The Record Research Associates. 2014

Periodicals / Journals

ARSC journal.

Fairfax, Va. : Association for Recorded Sound Collections, c1986-

Archive of Recorded Sound » Reference (non-circulating) » ML128 .P28 A84 V.41-42 2010-2011

Quarterly journal of the Association for Recorded Sound Collections.

The gramophone.

[London : C. Mackenzie, 1923?-

Music Library » Recordings

Monthly publication, dating back to 1923, which provides reviews of recent releases and historical reisssues. Also includes reviews of audio equipment.