May 2001 Number 74
Note: The online and printed editions of this newsletter may differ in content.
IN THIS ISSUE
Heads Up for MLA/SCC Fall Meeting!
From Our Chair
Well, it's happened . . . I've come to the end of my term as MLA/SCC Chair, and am ready to pass the torch on to Kevin McLaughlin and move into the past-chair position. It's been a successful year for the chapter, with several major bylaws changes, and I hope that the success continues. I've corresponded with Ray Heigemeir, the incoming chair of the Northern California Chapter, and he has some great ideas about joint meetings. I know that Kevin and Ray will be working to come up with some great possibilities for future programs.On the subject of programs, I'm happy to let you all know that we're busily planning for our Fall Meeting at the University of California, Santa Barbara for October 19-20th. Please mark your calendars now for what is shaping up to be an exciting meeting (and our chapter's 60th anniversary as well!). Until then, get ready for summer (let's hope it won't be too hot, and that the power holds)!
Kristina Shanton (CSU Long Beach)
From Our Incoming Chair
I am delighted to serve our chapter as Chair, beginning July 1st, 2001. Thanks to the efforts of Kristina Shanton and her predecessors, the Chapter is in great shape - if I can just begin to approach the standards she has set I will be doing very well indeed.Since I am new to the area, I am still meeting many of you for the first time at various chapter events. We are fortunate to have so many talented and creative members - just look at this newsletter! - and I can't wait to contribute in any way I can as Chair. I welcome your ideas and participation as well; groups work best when individuals are actively involved. Do not hesitate to contact me or any of our board members with your suggestions or questions.
I look forward to a happy and exciting year!
Kevin McLaughlin (CalArts)
Heads Up for MLA/SCC Fall Meeting!
Mark your calendars for the 2001 chapter meeting of the MLA/SCC, which will take place on October 19-20 at the University of California, Santa Barbara. This will be the first annual chapter meeting following our recent bylaws change specifying one meeting per year instead of two. In keeping with this change, we will depart from the recent pattern of one-day meetings and, instead, meet over a two-day period, beginning Friday afternoon and adjourning Saturday at noon. The program committee has already begun planning interesting and informative sessions (stay tuned!), and the local arrangements committee is planning a chapter dinner, to be followed by a concert by the Kronos Quartet on the UCSB campus. MLA/SCC chapter members will not want to miss a great opportunity to spend a fall weekend in beautiful Santa Barbara!Eunice Schroeder (UCSB), Chair, 2001 Local Arrangements Committee
Watch for Ballots in Your Mailbox!
You will soon be receiving two ballots via snail mail, one for Executive Board elections, the second addressing a proposed change to the MLA/SCC Bylaws. The text of the proposed bylaw change is given below in order to offer you plenty of time to consider your position on the question. When you receive your ballots, please vote and return them as soon as possible. As a help to you, the ballots will be sent with stamped and addressed return envelopes.
BALLOT: PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO MLA/SCC BYLAWS, ARTICLE VIII, A/2
Rationale. This amendment, proposed by the Executive Board, follows from the recently approved Bylaws amendment to article VII, sections A and B, specifying that there shall be one chapter meeting each year, normally to be held in the fall; previously, the Bylaws had specified that there be two, one in spring and one in fall. It is hoped that the additional planning time allowed by having only one meeting per year will enhance each meeting. Likewise, the need to produce three newsletters per year, currently mandated by the Bylaws, has sometimes resulted in difficulty finding enough suitable copy. A schedule of only two per year should ameliorate this problem and consequently enhance each issue. One of the two issues each year can focus on the annual fall meeting.
(The wording of the proposed change is italicized.)ARTICLE VIII, SECTION A, NUMBER 2
Current text:2. The newsletter will be issued at least three times annually.
Amended text:2. The newsletter will be issued at least two times annually.
What's Up? Jane Bentley, Cataloging Librarian, Copley Library, University of San Diego, is a new member of MLA/SCC. Welcome, Jane!
Monica J. Burdex (CSU Northridge) has two recently published reviews: Bean, Annemarie, editor. A Sourcebook of African-American Performance: Plays, People, Movements; and, Hill, John and Pamela Church Gibson, editors. World Cinema: Critical Approaches, in: Broadside: Newsletter of the Theatre Library Association, Fall 2000-Winter 2001.Additionally, Monica's bibliographical listing from the Chicago Defender and Pittsburgh Courier weekly newspapers on the Theater Owners' Booking Association (T.O.B.A.) is now mounted on her webpage.
Monica has also been selected to be the "Theater and Performing Arts" contributor for the forthcoming (2004) ALA Guide to Reference Books, 12th ed.
Vic Cardell moved to San Diego in late April with his partner Rob Melton, who began work on May 7 as UCSD's new Literature/Humanities Bibliographer. Vic and Rob spent the better part of a week driving from Lawrence, Kansas to San Diego with their standard poodles Jasiu and Tadzio. Along the way they enjoyed two and a half days in Flagstaff, Arizona, with side trips to Grand Canyon and Wupatki, Sunset Crater Volcano, and Walnut Canyon National Monuments. An unexpected surprise was the stunning beauty of the scenic Oak Creek Canyon route from Flagstaff to Sedona.While employed at UCLA from 1986 to 1994, Vic was a member of MLA/SCC, served on the executive board, and helped to plan the chapter's 50th anniversary. At the University of Chicago from 1994 to 1996, he was Music Bibliographer and Curator of the Chicago Jazz Archive. During the last four and a half years, he was Music and Dance Librarian at the University of Kansas, where he opened a new music and dance library facility last year. Vic is thrilled to be back in Southern California and looks forward to becoming active in chapter activities and seeing all of his old friends. He has been busy combing through Internet ads for library jobs; he even had a conference call interview on the day that the movers were packing in Lawrence. His address, phone, e-mail, and personal web site are: Vic Cardell, 4851 34th St., San Diego, CA 92116-1817, (619) 255-4365; vcardell@home.com; http://members.home.net/vcardell/.
Stephen Davison (UCLA) is Program Chair for MLA's 71st Annual Meeting in Las Vegas, NV, February 18-21, 2002.Stephen has a notable recent publication: "Von heute auf morgen: Schoenberg as Social Critic," in Political and Religious Ideas in the Works of Arnold Schoenberg. Ed. Charlotte M. Cross a nd Russell A. Berman. New York: Garland, 2000, p. 85-110.
Steve Fry (UCLA Music Library Emeritus) receives MLA Citation: On January 6, 2001, MLA's President Paula Matthews presented Steve Fry with the MLA citation for distinguished service to music librarianship. This highest honor of the Association includes honorary membership. The citation notes:
"Stephen Fry has actively contributed and supported the Association and the profession in a myriad of roles over his career in such a way as to have endeared himself in the hearts of many, energized all whom he touched, and enabled the organization to accomplish many wonderful things over the last 30 years. A well-known presence at MLA meetings, he has tackled a variety of challenging, complex tasks, for example, serving twice as Member-at-Large, twice as Program Chair, Local Arrangements Chair, Notes music periodicals and reference books editor, and as a member of several committees. Steve has been an inspiration to all, an invaluable member of the profession, and a treasure to his colleagues and the Association."Congratulations Steve, and thanks for everything!
Renée McBride (UCLA) has two fun new gigs with MLA: Placement Officer and MLA-IAWM (International Alliance for Women in Music) Liaison (supposedly replacing, as if that were remotely possible, our own Steve Fry).
Marion Scichilone (Downey City Library) has recently joined MLA/SCC. After working in hospital and academic medical libraries, she has made a mid-career change and is now Supervising Librarian for Technology & Technical Services at the Downey City Library. Marion is now the library's music selector and is an active volunteer for the Long Beach Symphony. She is also involved with LACASIS and chairs its 2001 Workshop Committee. Her hobbies include photography and collecting cookbooks. She is married to Jim, a native, and is one of the many transplanted individuals here from New England.
Steve Fry doesn't go gentle into that good night Last year several of our colleagues retired and entered a new stage of life. What are our friends doing with all that glorious time on their hands? In this and future newsletter issues, some of them will describe what we have to look forward to.
Dylan Thomas admonished that "Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage against the dying of the light." I'm not quite at the close of day yet, but having retired from the UCLA Music Library some months ago I thought all my library friends and colleagues would like to know what it is like entering the golden light at the end of this career tunnel and raging against the dying light. You might recall that I left the UCLA Music Library at the end of November, and that Frances and I had our farewell retirement party at the Ivy Sub Station facility in Culver City in January. Many of you came, which was an honor and a thrill, and it was a wonderful event.
Since then I seemed to have entered a new career as a performing musician. Many week-day evenings are spent with larger bands and weekends with smaller bands. I've been playing percussion (timpani, mallet instruments, bells, etc.) in the Santa Monica College Emeritus concert band, and the Los Angeles Police Band. Both groups comprise about 60 to 70 members, including flutes, trumpets, trombones, euphoniums, saxes, clarinets, tubas and a raft of percussionists.
I've also played piano and electric bass often with the Dan Walker Swing machine and the Westside Jazz Ensemble, a couple of exciting jazz big bands. If big bands had ever gone out of style you wouldn't know it from the long-time members of these bands, and several others locally in which I sub. Both bands play gigs every so often in local venues.
On weekends I've been performing with regularly with several smaller jazz groups at such diverse places as the Bel Air Bay Club, the Friars Club in Beverly Hills, the Shoreline Shopping Center in Long Beach, the Riverside Convention Center, many local country clubs and also myriad churches, hotels and private homes. A couple of memorable recent dates were the annual dinner dance of the Los Angeles Jr. Philharmonic Association at the Riveria Country Club and the National Arts Association awards dinner at the Bel Air Country Club. At the NAA event we accompanied John Raitt, Bonnie Raitt's father, who sang some of his old show tunes he made famous years ago on Broadway.
Recently I was appointed "Musical Director" of (and commissioned to write arrangements for) a dinner theater series at Crickett's Restaurant in the Rolling Hills Shopping Center in Torrance. I wrote about 40 arrangements for a 5-piece band and 6 singers, put together the band, and the rest is show business. The show, titled "Swing Broadway Sing," includes singing, dancing, comedy, and much interaction with the audience. It is delightful, very professional, and is quite successful. It plays every Friday and Saturday evening. In two acts, the first part covers about 20 tunes from the big band era, and the second part about 20 songs from the Broadway stage. Dinner theater is alive and well at Crickett's (2501 Pacific Coast Highway in the Rolling Hills Shopping Center, Crenshaw and PCH. Phone: 310-517-8777).
I've been able to cruise through all those terrific museums I'd not had much time for before retirement. I often go to Bergamot Station to peruse the new installations at the Santa Monica Art Museum and the scores of other art galleries there. I hadn't toured the county museums near the Coliseum for years, and have had that opportunity again. The IMAX theater, Museum of Natural History, California Science Center are all wonders of L.A. Poetry, fiction, how-to books and farming books are part of my life now, and I can sit down to read a New Yorker or Popular Science magazine cover to cover. And I savor lunches with a few friends at a plethora of wonderful hole-in-the-wall local restaurants. Some of my recent discoveries are Rincon, a Cuban eatery on Sepulveda just south of Culver Blvd., and Guelaguetzael, a Oaxacan place with tasty molés at Sepulveda at Palms, and Glorias, a Salvadoran restaurant on Venice Blvd. just east of Versailles.
Strangely, the TV is seldom on at home, and while the retired life is relaxing and relatively stressless, it is quite busy. I plan to spend a lot of the summer in Boise Valley, Idaho, where we maintain our small ranch where I grew up. I hope to see all of you at the October chapter meeting in Santa Barbara where we can talk about my recent wine discoveries and new and old authors.
And especially about music! Steve Fry (UCLA Music Library Emeritus)
Upcoming Meetings ALA Annual Conference 2001, San Francisco, CA, June 14-20, 2001
Feminist Theory and Music 6: Confluence and Divide, Boise, Idaho, July 5-8, 2001
Legacies: Five Hundred Years of Printed Music: a conference presented in celebration of the quincentenary of Petrucci's Harmonice musices odhecaton A, the accomplishments of musicologist Helen Hewitt, and fifty years of the Ph.D. program in musicology at the University of North Texas, Denton, TX, October 24-27, 2001. For more information, see p. 24 of the March-April 2001 issue of the MLA Newsletter or e-mail MLA member Mark McKnight.
IAML (International Association of Music Libraries, Archives and Documentation Centres) 19th Congress, Périgueux, France, July 8-13, 2001
ISMIR (International Symposium on Music Information Retrieval) 2001, Bloomington, IN, October 15-17, 2001
Partch Centennial at UCLA, Schoenberg Hall, May 26, 2001
Workshop on Cataloging Audiovisual Materials and Electronic Resources, San Jose State University, July 9-13, 2001, taught by Nancy B. Olson, retired professor and cataloger from Minnesota State University, Mankato. The workshop will focus on the cataloging of electronic resources (especially Internet resources) and DVDs. It will also cover descriptive cataloging and MARC 21 coding and tagging of videos (including DVDs), talking books/audiobooks, maps, puppets and other two- and three-dimensional materials, and electronic resources including CD-ROMs, books with discs, interactive multimedia, and Internet resources, following the Anglo-American Cataloging Rules, second edition, 1998 revision, with recent JSC-approved (but not yet published) changes. Enrollment in the workshop is limited to 30. Attendees must have some background, either coursework and/or experience, in basic book cataloging using AACR2 -- this workshop is an advanced cataloging experience. The workshop may be taken as a workshop or for graduate credit. For costs, registration information, housing and school information, contact: Blanche Woolls, Director, School of Library & Information Science, San Jose State University, San Jose, CA 95192-0029; phone (408) 924-2490; or John Fife, Office Manager.
MLA/SCC Executive Board
Chair: Kristina Shanton, CSU, Long Beach
Vice Chair/Chair Elect: Kevin McLaughlin, California Institute of the Arts
Secretary/Treasurer: Nanette Schneir, Santa Monica Public Library
Members-At-Large: Joan Flintoff LoPear, UCLA
Eunice Schroeder, UC-Santa Barbara
Past Chair: Rhonelle Runner, Occidental College
MLA/SCC Newsletter, No. 74, May 2001
Editor: Renée McBride, UCLAThe MLA/SCC Newsletter is published three times a year. Please send communications to: Renée McBride, UCLA Young Research Library, A1538 YRL, Box 951575, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1575; e-mail: rmcbride@library.ucla.edu; phone: (310) 206-5853; fax: (310) 206-4947
Music Library Association, Southern California Chapter