David Day, director of the BYU Music Library housed in the Harold B. Lee Library, has announced the donation of an extensive recording library from Classical 89, KBYU-FM - BYU's public radio station.
This collection of more than 20,000 disks includes LP's that were played on KBYU-FM until the arrival of the compact disc, and The Raymond and Richard Goecks Historical Vocal Recording Collection, a specialized group of opera and concert disks, some dating back to the 1900's. The collection was donated to KBYU-FM in the 1980s with the assistance of Giorgio Tozzi, the noted basso from the Metropolitan Opera, who was teaching at BYU at the time.
Several 16-inch radio transcription discs (and player) are also included, from a collection donated by Frank Seeley, an Air Force producer and collector.
Day is enthusiastic about receiving the collection.
"These interesting and now difficult to locate recordings constitute a collection developed with skill and care over several decades," he says. "Moving them to the Music Recordings Archive in the Lee Library will make them accessible to the BYU community and general public. It will also make possible opportunities for digital preservation and enhancement."
Walter Rudolph, general manager of KBYU-FM, expressed his pleasure in the cooperative arrangement. "KBYU-FM will still have access to these special recordings for program production. We hope and believe there will be immense academic value in the arrangement that has been made," he said.
According to Day, the BYU Music Recordings Archive can be ranked among the top 10 Sound Archives in the country, which include the Library of Congress, The Rogers and Hammerstein Archive Recorded Sound at the New York Public Library, and extensive sound archives at Bolling Green State, Stanford, and Yale Universities.
KBYU-FM, at 89.1 mHz, provides a format of classical music, news and programming related to Brigham Young University.
Writer: Christine Nokleby
