Re: 19th Century guitar music to download

Date: Mon, 03 Mar 2003 17:31:05 -0500
Newsgroups: rec.music.classical.guitar
Size: 2,760 bytes

SW wrote:
> > What makes you think a museum will make it available to others? I've
> > seen very few displays of old music in museums, public or private. There
> > was a terrific exhibit at the Morgan library some years ago, which I
> > unfortunately had little time to examine. I remember seeing no guitar
> > music on display.
> > My guess is that the better music libraries have some of these
> > materials. Unfortunately, as MO has told me, much is in terrible condition
> > because of the poor paper quality.
> > Yes, I would prefer that scholars be able to locate and use old
> > scores. I don't necessarily think it would do better in the basement of a
> > museum than in the hands of a knowledgeable publisher that knows this
> > music.
> >
> > Steve
>
> Don't museums - or libraries as I should have said - make their
> contents available
> to whoever wants to see it? I am not an expert in this field. But many museums and libraries have large
parts of their collections in musty storage rooms, often uncataloged. I'm sure
there are others that have research collections available only to scholars. Some classical guitar societies must certainly have libraries, and university
music departments have these materials as well. But since many of these
materials are in such poor condition, it is unlikely that they are available to
the general public, except perhaps as facsimiles. In any case, you sound like you think Matanya should bequeath his music
collection to a public library. I'm not going to say this is a bad idea. In
fact, I would be interested in what becomes of large guitar music collections in
private hands. Some of this material is doubtless more of interest to guitarists
than to collectors in general. For this reason, the market is small, and the
monetary value I'd guess is relatively limited. But in the end, it is Matanya's music. After a couple of years on this
newsgroup, I'm just starting to get a sense of the scope of fine music out
there. I'm glad to have experts here to tell me what not to waste a lot of time
on. If you're interested in some of these materials, they do occasionally become
available on ebay, estate sales, or other sources. I purchased a load of 19th
and early 20th century guitar music from a guy in Brooklyn. I got a heads up on
the material for sale right here on the newsgroup.
Steve
> No doubt guitar music is not on display
> anywhere but it's available for any interested party to see, isn't it?
> And if it's sitting in Matanya's latrine or wherever he has it, it
> isn't available for anyone to see. And if he runs out of toilet paper
> what happens then?
--
Mark & Steven Bornfeld DDS
Brooklyn, NY
718-258-5001
http://www.dentaltwins.com