MusicSG: A Digital Music Archive of Singapore's Music
2015; Volume: 62; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
ISSN
2471-156X
Autores Tópico(s)Diverse Musicological Studies
ResumoMusicSG is a non-profit digital archive set up to digitize, archive and provide access to all forms of published Singapore musical works. It brings together a collection of music composed or published by Singaporeans, music produced or published in Singapore, and music related to Singapore. Set up by the National Library Board, Singapore (NLB), MusicSG aims to raise awareness of Singapore music as well as provide resources for research and discovery. This initiative also contributes to NLB's role in the preservation of Singapore's artistic heritage and legacy. Background It took several years for MusicSG to take its current form. The idea for a digital archive of recorded music from Singapore was first mooted in 2006. The intent then was to have a startup database of endangered local music that would later be expanded to include popular and traditional music from the Asian region. Initially titled ARCAsia (ARChive of Music Asia), the project's objective was to provide access to recorded music from the 1940s to 1980s in a digital format to support scholars, researchers, composers and students in their study and research. There was a need to develop an archive of this nature due to fears that audio collections held by disparate sources such as government agencies, music associations, and private individuals might become obsolete or have quality loss over time. It was thus deemed important to bring together these audio collections, which might otherwise be lost, and find a way to digitize and preserve them. Not only would there be a single repository that would greatly enhance searching for long-lost melodies and folk-songs but also current and future generations of users could access these collections with greater convenience. As music and audio-visual librarians are well aware, musical recordings are fraught with complex rights issues. Multiple streams of clearances need to be sought in order for an institution to be able to digitize and provide access to a wider audience. This issue is further compounded for music tracks recorded in decades past where provenance may be near-impossible to verify or come from recording companies that may have become defunct. Against this backdrop, prior to MusicSG's original launch in November 2010, ARCAsia was repositioned to be a digital archive on recorded music from Singapore. This was largely due to rights issues and the complexities navigating right clearances for music beyond Singapore. However, this repositioning led to the birth of MusicSG. Major Developments in 2013 First launched in 2010, the original MusicSG website was in need of a make-over and injection of new content. Due to organisational and project-related changes, there was a brief hiatus in on-going operational work and outreach activities. The website, however, continued to receive a sizeable number of hits and page-views but it was also decided that the content could be better packaged. With a dedicated project manager on board as well as funding to refresh the portal in 2013, exciting developments were soon underway. The following sections highlight the new additions and changes to MusicSG, in 2013, which then made possible the launch of the revamped portal. Content highlights MusicSG's collection is built primarily by music contributions received from the public and music industry players, who share and deposit their published works in the music archive. Intellectual property copyrights must be cleared before the National Library can provide access to the music resources. The refurbished MusicSG portal provides a one-stop music resource for users who want to conveniently access music resources and learn more about how Singapore's music scene has evolved over the years. From its initial collection of 6,000 works in 2010, MusicSG's resources have grown to over 13,000 works (end of 2014). The resources include both audio and text material: tracks, scores, lyrics, biographies, videos, articles and more. …
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