Overview
The databases listed to the right are mostly subscription databases which the library has paid for to provide you with the most credible and authoritative information possible.
Many of the databases are not focused exclusively on music, but contain a good deal of music-related material within their interdisciplinary content.
Music Databases - How To
Music databases often have unique ways of searching and organizing their data. Here are some tips:
Oxford Music Online (Grove)
- Grove Music Online User's Manual
- Topical Guides to Grove Music Online
- Use CTRL-F to search for keywords or composition titles within the composer biography articles
- When you look up a composer biography article, check the Bibliography at the end for additional books and articles about the composer
Naxos Music Library
- You can search the Naxos database directly or search the library catalog for the music and limit to Online Resources. Both will get you to CDs in Naxos.
- Look for a CD with the Naxos label that has the work you are looking for. Then on that CD's page, use the "Booklet" link in the left sidebar to view the CD liner booklet.
Daniels' Orchestral Music Online
- Search or browse by composer, then pick their work off the list
- With the entry for each composition, you can find the date of the first performance, the duration (how long the piece is), the original instrumentation, and other notes and details
Historical Newspapers
- Accessible Archives This link opens in a new windowThis resource includes text from historical periodicals and books including eyewitness accounts of historical events, descriptions of daily life, editorial observations, commerce as seen through advertisements and genealogical records. Collections include but are not limited to African American Newspapers, The Civil War Collection, The Pennsylvania Gazette, South Carolina Newspapers, Godey`s Lady`s Book 1830-1898, the Lily, and The Virginia Gazette.
- African American Newspapers (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new windowThis collection of African American newspapers contains a wealth of information about cultural life and history during the 1800s and is rich with first-hand reports of the major events and issues of the day.
- African American Newspapers, Series 1 (Readex) This link opens in a new windowProvides access to approximately 270 U.S. newspapers chronicling a century and a half of the African American experience. This collection features papers from more than 35 states—including many rare and historically significant 19th century titles. Coverage: 1827-1998.
- America's Historical Newspapers (Readex) This link opens in a new windowSearch more than 1,400 U.S. historical newspapers from all 50 states published between 1690 and 1922. Collections include African American Newspapers and Early American Newspapers, Series 1 - 7.
- British Library Newspapers (Gale) This link opens in a new windowTaken directly from the extensive holdings of the British Library, this collection includes London national newspapers, English regional papers, home country newspapers from Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, and titles in specialist areas such as Victorian radicalism and Chartism. Coverage: 1800-1900.
- The Civil War Collection (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new windowThis collection of newspapers, personal narratives, and regimental histories is divided into seven parts: A Newspaper Perspective; The Soldiers’ Perspective; The Generals’ Perspective; A Midwestern Perspective; Iowa’s Perspective; Northeast Regimental Histories; and Abraham Lincoln Library Abolitionist Books.
- Frank Leslie's Weekly (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new windowFounded in 1855 and continued until 1922, this was an American illustrated literary and news publication, and one of several started by publisher and illustrator Frank Leslie.
- Newspapers.com World Collection (Ancestry & ProQuest) This link opens in a new windowThis newspaper archive contains searchable, full-page images of over 4000 state, regional, and local newspapers in the United States and other countries from the early 1700s to the 2000s.
- Nineteenth Century U.S. Newspapers (Gale) This link opens in a new windowOver 28 million articles of primary source newspaper content from the 19th-century, featuring full-text content and images from newspapers from a range of urban and rural regions throughout the U.S. The collection encompasses the entire 19th century, with an emphasis on such topics as the American Civil War, African-American culture and history, Western migration and the Antebellum-era. Newspapers from all 19th-century U.S. states and territories are included.
- ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The New York Times with Index This link opens in a new windowOnline, full-image, and searchable content of The New York Times from September 18, 1851 to the present with a 4-year embargo. Includes articles, advertisements, and political cartoons. Search options include keyword, article type, by date, author, or browse by issue.
- ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The Wall Street Journal This link opens in a new windowOnline, full-image, and searchable content of The Wall Street Journal from July 8, 1889 to the present with an 18-year embargo. In 1889, Dow Jones & Company first published The Wall Street Journal as a markets-focused newspaper for shareholders. Today, it focuses not only on the stock market, but on all aspects of global business, economics, and consumer affairs
- Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection (Gale) This link opens in a new windowProvides full-text access to the British Library's collection of the newspapers, pamphlets, and books (primarily published in London, with some English provincial, Irish and Scottish papers, and examples from the American colonies) gathered by Reverend Charles Burney (1757-1817).
- The Sunday Times (London) Historical Archive (Gale) This link opens in a new windowThe Sunday Times has provided thoughtful analysis and commentary on the week’s news and society at large since 1822. Despite the similarity of names, The Sunday Times was an entirely separate paper from The Times until 1966, when both papers came under common ownership. To this day, The Sunday Times remains editorially independent from The Times, with its own remit and perspective on the news. Coverage: 1822-2016.
- The Times (London) Digital Archive (Gale) This link opens in a new windowResearchers can search through the complete digital edition of The Times (London), using keyword searching to retrieve full facsimile images of either a specific article or a complete page. The entire newspaper is captured, with all articles, advertisements and illustrations/photos divided into categories to facilitate searching. Coverage: 1785-2012.
- The Times Literary Supplement (London) Historical Archive (Gale) This link opens in a new windowSince 1902, the Times Literary Supplement has forged a reputation for fine writing, literary discoveries and insightful debate. The TLS has attracted the contributions of the world’s most influential writers and critics, from T.S. Eliot and Virginia Woolf in the 1920s and 30s to A.N. Wilson and Christopher Hitchens in the 1990s and 2000s. Coverage: 1902-2019.
- The Virginia Gazette (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new windowPublished weekly in Williamsburg, Virginia between 1736 and 1780, The Virginia Gazette contained news covering all of Virginia and also included information from other colonies, Scotland, England and additional countries.
- Wisconsin Newspaper Archive This link opens in a new windowA digital collection of Wisconsin newspapers with coverage going back to 1813.
- Women's Suffrage Collection (Accessible Archives) This link opens in a new windowThis collection covers much of the women's rights movement from the mid-1800s to the early 1900s. It includes newspapers that had some overlap between the temperance and women’s rights movements, as well as an anti-suffrage paper.
Music Databases
The first group of databases is the core list for this subject.
Search@UW will look at the following databases: Garland Encyclopedia of World Music, OneFile (Gale), JSTOR, Project Muse, and others.
- Oxford Music Online This link opens in a new windowOxford Music Online includes access to The Oxford Dictionary of Music, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, The New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, and The Oxford Companion to Music. Combined, these resources cover every aspect of the music world including bibliographies on composers and musicians and hundreds of carefully selected and classified links to international musical sites.
Note: This resource is limited to 3 simultaneous users. If access is unavailable, please try again later. - Music Index (EBSCO) @ EBSCOhost This link opens in a new windowFormerly The Music Index Online by Harmonie Park Press, Music Index contains cover-to-cover indexing and abstracts of articles about music, musicians and the music industry. In addition to journal articles, it provides citations for book reviews, obituaries and news articles. Coverage: 1970-present.
- Music Online: Classical Scores Library (Alexander Street) This link opens in a new windowEncompasses all major classical musical genres and time periods from the Middle Ages to the 21st century. Includes full, study, piano, and vocal scores.
- Naxos Music Library This link opens in a new windowNaxos Music Library is the world´s largest online classical music library. While the collection primarily consists of classical pieces, it also includes a selection of jazz, world, and pop/rock music. Text resources, including overviews of music history, program notes for recordings, and the complete libretti of operas, are also available. Follow these instructions to create your own playlists in Naxos Music Library.
Note: This resource is limited to 5 simultaneous users. - Gale OneFile: Fine Arts This link opens in a new windowThis resource covers drama, music, art history, and filmmaking, with full text of over 250 journals indexed in databases such as the Wilson Art Index and Répertoire International de Littérature Musicale (RILM).
- Music Online: African American Music Reference (Alexander Street) This link opens in a new windowThousands of essays, images, liner notes and more covering blues, jazz, spirituals, civil rights songs, slave songs, minstrelsy, rhythm and blues, gospel, and other forms of black American musical expression. Includes biographies of 185 African American composers.
- Vogue Archive (ProQuest) This link opens in a new windowVogue provides a record of American and international popular culture; it is a unique primary source for the study of fashion, gender and modern social history. Marketing students can research the history of a brand identity by viewing every advertisement for a brand such as Revlon, Coty, Versace or Chanel between specified dates. Researchers in cultural studies and gender studies can explore themes such as body image, gender roles and social tastes from the 1890s to the present. The latest issue will be added each month with no embargo period. Users can search through all text, captions, and titles throughout the magazine, including advertisements, covers and fold-outs.
- Newspapers & News Sources - LibGuideWhen searching for information about premiere performances of musical compositions, you may find reviews and context in the newspapers of the time
The following databases, while not focusing exclusively on music, may also be useful.
- Academic Search Ultimate (EBSCO) @ EBSCOhost This link opens in a new windowA scholarly, multi-disciplinary full-text database, with more than 8,500 full-text periodicals, including over 7,000 peer-reviewed journals. In addition to full text, this database offers indexing and abstracts for more than 12,500 journals and a total of more than 13,200 publications including monographs, reports, conference proceedings, etc. for a variety of disciplines.
- Arts & Humanities Citation Index (Clarivate) @ Web of Science This link opens in a new windowFully covers over 1,800 scholarly journals across 28 arts & humanities disciplines. Specializes in cited reference searching for comprehensive identification of later works that have cited an article published in one of the covered journals. Part of the Web of Science Core Collection database. Coverage: 1975-present.
- Gale Academic OneFile This link opens in a new windowThis database indexes and provides selected full text for thousands of scholarly journals and other authoritative sources across many academic disciplines. Subjects covered include the physical sciences, technology, medicine, social sciences, the arts, and literature.
- eBook Collection @ EBSCOhost This link opens in a new windowIncludes over 13,000 books on a broad variety of topics.
- Humanities International Complete (Whitston Publishing) @ EBSCOhost This link opens in a new windowThis resource includes full text of hundreds of journals, books and other published sources from around the world. Citations and abstracts are included from over 2,300 journals with full text for more than 1,200. Major subject areas include literature, philosophy, the arts, history, and culture, with a special emphasis on literature and the literary arts.
- JSTOR This link opens in a new windowAccess to the full text of scholarly journals from a variety of disciplines. Coverage: varies. Collections include: Arts and Science I - XV, Business IV, Life Sciences, and Sustainability. Access to JSTOR Arts & Sciences V - XIV, Business IV, Life Sciences, and Sustainability is made possible by UWL Student Differential Tuition. Access to the JSTOR Arts & Sciences XV collection is made possible by the Murphy Library Endowment Fund and UWL Student Differential Tuition.
- Gale Ebooks This link opens in a new windowA collection of over 70 encyclopedias and reference titles covering a variety of subjects.
- WorldCat (OCLC) This link opens in a new windowA union catalog of the holdings of more than 10,000 libraries worldwide (including UW-Madison but NOT including UWL or other UW libraries), with listings for more than 670 million books and other items. Books and other materials identified in WorldCat can be requested using Interlibrary Loan.
Off Campus Access
Most of our research databases require users to log in with their UWL credentials. When you are asked for a username and password:
- Students: In the username box, enter your UWL NetID. Example: lastname.firs (Most UWL NetID user names follow this format: first 8 letters of your last name followed by a dot (.) followed by the first 4 letters of your first name.)
- Faculty: In the username box, enter your UWL NetID. Example: Flastname Most Faculty and Staff UWL NetID user names follow this format: first name initial followed by the last name.)
- Emeritus: In the username box, enter your NetID. Example: Flastname or lastname.firstname. In the password box, enter your two digit birth month, two digit birth day@UWL. Example: 0929@uwl
- DO NOT include @students.uwlax.edu or @uwlax.edu as part of your username. In the password box, enter your UWL NetID password.
- Remember, you will use the exact same user name and login as you use to login to Canvas and in GCA Computer Labs - your NetID.
Music History
