Catherine%20Owen

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• Catherine Owen
• Describing Performing Arts Data in the Digital
  Environment
• Performing Arts Data Service
• University of Glasgow

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Performing arts data service
The PADS is based at the Gilmorehill Centre for
Theatre, Film and Television at the University of
Glasgow in Scotland.

• The PADS is one of five service providers of the
  Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS)
• Other Services include
• History
• Archaeology
• Visual Arts
• Textual Studies

Tower and cloisters, Glasgow University,
architect Sir George Gilbert Scott, 1868
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What we do
The PADS works with performance practitioners,
archives, academics, and the performance
industries and their representatives the PADS
collects, documents, preserves and promotes the
use of digital resources in teaching, learning
and research.

• dance
• theatre
• music
• film
• broadcast arts

Birmingham Repertory Theatres Production of
Hamlet, 1925 Courtesy Sir Barry Jackson
Trust/Birmingham Central Library
The PADS collects resources relating to music,
dance, theatre, film and the broadcast arts...
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Some key questions

• What is a collection?
• How does cataloguing change when Im describing
  digital objects?
• What concepts do I need to describe?
• How will users access my resources?
• How will my resources interoperate with others?

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What is a collection?

• A database? A selection of images? A digital
  text?
• Is the collection a static or dynamic concept?
  Who defines what fits together?
• Does collection mean physical location? Is this
  meaningful when your archive is virtual?
• How should we control the levels at which
  documentation is applied?

All images courtesy Donald Cooper/Photostage
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Digital or analogue? Different concepts?
Different users?
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What do users want?
An academic may seek... Russian chamber music of
the early 19th century A performer may
want... Music for violin, cello, bassoon, horn
and harp A teacher may want... Advanced grade
pieces between 1750 and 1900 A producer may be
looking for... 19th century salon music They
will all be happy with Glinkas Serenade on
themes from Donizettis Anna Bolena - but how
can we make sure that they find it?
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Performing arts documentation

• Always the same old problems
• Who?
• Chaykovsy or Tchiakovsky
• Bernard Shaw or George Bernard Shaw or Shaw,
  G.B.
• Where?
• Theatre Royal Bristol or Bristol Old Vic or
  Bristol New Vic...
• What?
• Eroica or Symphony no.3 Eb op.55

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Interoperability

• Which classification scheme?
• Dewey (including Reeves/McColvin revised Dewey)?
• UDC?
• LC?
• Specialist subject-specific identifiers?
• (opus numbers, scholarly works, in-house
  schema)
• Which name authority list?
• New Grove Dictionaries, AllMedia Guides, IMDB
• Which naming convention?
• AACR2?

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Performing arts classification
Classification schemes are not enough Are we
describing the medium or the intellectual
content? What is the subject of this
work? What do users need to find? Score or sound
recording or music literature?
Autumn Moon courtesy Edward McGuire
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Describing the performance

• Is the performance the obvious
  collection-level?
• - performing arts essentially people, activity
  and event-related
• - many collections are of performance-related
  ephemera
• - can offer useful parallels for other subject
  areas e.g. archaeology
• What are the drawbacks?
• - not all performance data is specifically
  event-related
• - existing standards not designed to describe
  temporal concepts
• - multiple creators, dates, publishers
• - defining location complex

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Resources for performing arts cataloguers

• Grove Music Dictionaries
• http//www.grovemusic.com/
• Internet Movie Database
• http//www.imdb.com/
• Internet Theatre Database
• http//www.theatredb.com/
• Authority tools for audio-visual cataloguing
• http//ublib.buffalo.edu/libraries/units/cts/olac/
  capc/authtools.html
• Information Sources in Music
• http//rylibweb.man.ac.uk/data1/ad/guides/intrmus.
  html
• IASA Cataloguing Rules
• http//www.llgc.org.uk/iasa/icat/

Michael Gambon, King Lear RSC 1983 Courtesy
Donald Cooper / Photostage