Review: Music Preservation and Archiving Today (2018)
Jean Ballard Terepka
Norie Guthrie and Scott Carlson, eds. Music Preservation and Archiving Today. Rowman and Littlefield, 2018. 210 pages. Paperback, $40.00.
This fine book covers issues much larger than the modest title indicates: its subject is not just the preservation of recent and contemporary non-classical American music — rock and roll, punk, folk … “counter-cultural” — but also the artists who produce it and the audiences who receive it. Music Preservation and Archiving Today editors Norie Guthrie and Scott Carlson divide their book of eleven essays written by a total of fourteen scholars and practitioners, into three sections; the broad topics include “strategies for documenting local music communities,” “leveraging archival materials,” and collecting and curating materials of outsider music and musicians (vii-viii). In one way or another, all the essays address the core challenges concerning the project of chronicling and understanding contemporary music: much of the music exists by way of contrast to the institutions which might have the resources to preserve it. Creativity and cultural resistance and do not organize themselves in ways that facilitate the subsequent work of preservationists and historians. In addition, for contemporary popular music especially, where the art form is ceaselessly evolving away from tradition, archivists are constantly challenged to keep up with changing sounds, social groups and signifiers. Institutional procedures for preservation are often at odds with impulses of improvisation, experiment and rebellion, forces that must destroy some of what’s been inherited to create something new.
Most of the essays in this volume are written by special collection archivists and librarians based in universities well known for, among other things, their commitment to contemporary non-classical music. These include the editors themselves and Andrew Klein at Rice University, Jeremy Berg at University of North Texas, Rory Grennan at Florida State University, Melissa Haley and Megan Fraser at University of California at Los Angeles, Anthony Kwame Harrison at Virginia Tech. and Katherine Nicols and Scott W. Schwartz at University of Illinois at Urbana. Non-academic writers include Jesse Jurnow, a critic and DJ, Andy Leach and Jennie Thomas, both of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Archives, and Jessica Thompson, a restoration engineer and independent audio archive specialist. The essays highlight differences among existing collections that require organization and cataloguing, the acquisition or creation of collections, and the acknowledgment of non-academic collections.
Individual essays address general preservation issues by means of particular case studies. Leach and Thomas, writing about local music in Northeast Ohio, ask the question, “In light of the ephemeral nature of popular music materials and the nomadic life-style of its performers, how do you properly capture the history and influence of something that is over in three minutes and 30 seconds?” (3). Their answer lies in a blurring of the lines that sometimes separate archivists from historians: you become something of a cultural detective, finding guidance in diverse, but overlapping fields of music journalism, criticism and commentary and archiving manuals. Grennan, Nichols and Schwartz’s essay gives an exceptionally clear account of the 2013 Urbana-Champaign Local Music Preservation Initiative at the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music at the University of Illinois Library. With clarity and economy, the authors cover topics such as advisor selection, current documentation assessment, oral history and public engagement endeavors, providing a model for similar initiatives in other areas of the United States.
Klein explores academic applicability of music collections: he describes the dimensions and usefulness of Rice University’s Houston Folk Music Archive within the context of the university community as a whole. Klein demonstrates how use of the Archive’s materials can sharpen students’ understanding of the interpretation and value of primary sources, deepen their ability to see material within its contexts of both traditional narratives and new cultural patterns, and give them a well-informed appreciation of Houston.
Some of the essays focus on very specific challenges of audio preservation. Thompson, in “Mastering the Sonics of Historic Recording Media,” describes herself as both “engineer and archaeologist” (84). Thompson’s essay, Harrison’s on hip-hop in its ethnographic context, Berg’s on record reissuing and Carlson’s on fan-generated bootleg compilations all address the immediate challenges of modern recording media, ranging from records and audiocassette tapes to digital audio software. All these writers acknowledge that recorded music varies according to its origins — whether it comes from musicians themselves, producers, engineers, distributors or fans — and presents a wide variety of different strengths and drawbacks as well as preservation challenges. In all these areas, archivists seeking to preserve different sorts of music must constantly update their skills — and equipment — as technology itself advances.
All of the essays in this book are clearly, effectively annotated; there are detailed, abundant, useful references. All the writers are clearly music lovers: they are immersed in the musical worlds whose creative processes and products they preserve and chronicle. In short: they totally know their stuff. They also share a keen sense of mission firmly rooted in both affection for their subject, esteem for future historians and dedication to the development of sound professional practices. Two appendices provide sound tools for those who might plan to engage in their own music preservation projects. The “Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Scan Day Permission and Donation Form” offers a common-sense procedure for documenting and acquiring material from individual donors, engaging the public in preservation as a form of cultural service. The “Indie Preserves Survey,” created by Guthrie and Carlson, provides professional, amateur, academic and independent archivists and collectors with the ability to know ‘where to begin’ as they think about their own possible music preservation projects.
This is a substantive, careful book. It represents current practitioners’ best practices in a field that must accommodate traditional approaches to categorizing, organizing and cataloguing on the one hand and the many amorphous shapes of dynamic, music communities emerging from complex cultural contexts on the other. This is also a forward-looking book. Music technologies and trends will always be evolving; the skills and procedures of their chroniclers must evolve as well, relying on imagination and innovation to match their material. The writers of this book share a deep respect for the intrinsic value of the music they discuss as well as a common professional purpose: to ensure the future preservation of music’s creation and reception. In presenting their various approaches to particular situations and answers to particular problems, they encourage collegial conversations about the material at hand and offer sound models for colleagues, students and independent archivists.
Jean Ballard Terepka is Archivist at St. Michael’s Church and Vice-President, National Episcopal Historians and Archivists Board of Trustees
