KMMC 102: Music History Research Skills

Getting started: compiling a Bibliography

There is a reciprocal relationship between your essay planning and your research: consulting a wide
range of sources will help you to establish your topic in more detail, and as your essay plan develops
this will in turn help to narrow down your search for further sources.

In the early stages of your research you may only have a general idea of your research topic or
question. To begin with you should consult general music history texts and sources which contain a
Bibliography or further reading list. As your research develops supplement this with more specialist
books and journal articles to add depth to your coverage.

Books

Browse the web and the collections in KM Library and Anna Centenary Library for books relevant to
your topic. There are two general categories of academic book: single-author texts (monographs), and
multiple-author texts edited by one or more authors and containing several different chapters. e.g.:

Richard Taruskin, The Oxford History of Western Music, 5 vols. (Oxford University Press, 2009)
Julie Anne Sadie (ed.), Companion to Baroque Music (University of California Press, 1990)

Journal articles

Journals are topic-specific collections of shorter articles, issued several times per year. Most journals
are now available in electronic form, and there are several ways to access them online. There are
hundreds of different specialist music journals; some of the more useful titles for KMMC102 are:

Music & Letters Journal of Musicology Journal of the Royal Musical Association
Early Music The Musical Quarterly The Musical Times
Journal of the American Musicological Society

A full journal article citation should include the following: Author, ‘article title’, journal title, issue
no., date and page numbers.

e.g. Alexander H. Shapiro, ‘‘Drama of an infinitely superior nature’: Handel’s Early English
Oratorios and the Religious Sublime’, Music & Letters 74 (1993), 215–245.

Using the Web

The internet can be a useful method of locating academic book and journal content, but it requires
care and patience. Many academic texts are available for full or partial online access.

JSTOR: database archive of journals from the humanities and social sciences

DOAJ (Directory of Open Access Journals): links to free access music journals

Google Books and Google Scholar: books.google.co.in/uk scholar.google.co.in/uk

These are useful portals to browse for reference material, but have limited access to full text. You can
find references here and then use JSTOR or Anna Centenary Library to locate the full text.
Using sources

Take notes as you read to summarise key points and useful quotations. This note-taking stage is
crucial for understanding what you read and absorbing a range of scholarship into your work. Make
sure you include the details of the source and the page number for future reference.

There are several different ways that you can incorporate research material into your essay. The main
thing to remember is that the dominant narrative voice in the essay should be yours: references and
quotations are for supporting the ideas and arguments that you have developed from your reading.

In-text references include: Author surname, date, and page numbers, e.g. (Burrows 1997, p.17)

Bibliographies include full author, title and publication details (see below).

 Summarising research or subject matter to demonstrate knowledge of the topic

‘Handel’s music has been studied from a variety of angles, including sources, performance
practice and historical context, for example in the essays collected in The Cambridge
Companion to Handel (Burrows 1997). This essay will focus on...’

 Citing a fact or detail

‘Handel’s Israel in Egypt was premiered at the King’s Theatre, London, on 4th April 1739
(Lang 1966, p.310).

 Citing an argument or opinion

Strohm has argued that we should assess Handel’s London operas against the composer’s
attitudes and preferences towards the conventions of Italian opera (Strohm 1985, p.35).

 Using paraphrase or quotation to support your argument

Paraphrase:
C. Steven La Rue has argued that the emphasis on vocal virtuosity in the da capo aria has
contributed to its neglect as a serious dramatic art form. (LaRue 1997, p.111).

Direct quotation:
Part of the reason behind criticism of Handel’s operas may be the da capo aria, as C. Steven
LaRue suggests: ‘the da capo aria has often been seen as a vehicle for vocal improvisation
and a shameless showcase for brilliant virtuoso singing rather than as a form suitable for
musical or dramatic expression’ (LaRue 1997, p.111).

Bibliography

 Donald Burrows (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Handel (Cambridge University Press,
1997).
 Paul Henry Lang, George Frederick Handel (Norton & Co, 1966, repub. Dover, 1996)
 C. Steven LaRue, ‘Handel and the Aria’, in Donald Burrows (ed.), The Cambridge
Companion to Handel (Cambridge University Press, 1997), 111-121.
 Reinard Strohm, Essays on Handel and Italian Opera (Cambridge University Press, 1985)