RISM Data Now in EROMM

Thursday, September 10, 2020

Digitized musical sources (manuscripts, printed music, writings on music theory, libretti) from RISM are now available through EROMM Search.

EROMM is the European Register of Microform and Digital Masters, which has the goal of coordinating digitization and microfilming activities and helping users find out where such surrogates are available. There are over 40,000,000 records in EROMM representing all fields of study. There are over a dozen partners around Europe who have contributed to EROMM, including major national and university libraries.

RISM links to over 56,000 digitized music sources worldwide, providing users with direct access to digital objects through RISM records. Online resources and information about holding institutions were taken from RISM’s SRU server and matched to EROMM records.

The search works best if you have a concrete item you are searching for; there are no filters for music specifically or music-specific attributes. On the other hand, the presence of music in EROMM puts music items in the wider context of handwritten and printed materials. A search for “Ludwig van Beethoven” and “sonatas” finds not only an autograph manuscript of the composer’s op. 111 (RISM ID no. 464001329) but also 19th-century editions not yet in RISM and a volume of criticism by Donald Francis Tovey (available on microfilm).

The entire RISM dataset (records and corresponding authority files) is available as open data and linked open data, and can be downloaded through the RISM Catalog’s data page. The data can also be accessed through the SRU servers. The RISM data can be freely used under a Creative Commons CC-BY license. Earlier this year, we reported that the RISM dataset was added to the re3data repository. We are happy to see continued use of our data in other contexts.

Category: New at RISM