Hi all, I am new to reading discographies and was wondering if there are
certain discographical "standards" for notation and structure of an
entry. For example a title entry such as:
| LA TRAVIATA (Giuseppe Verdi / Francesco M.
Piave), II/ 5: Duetto (Germont) "Pura siccome un angelo"
<1> |
I can figure a few things out "La Traviata" is the title, Verdi wrote the
music, Piave wrote the (words?) what does II/5 mean and the rest? what does
<1> mean?
Eugene,
"Generally accepted" standards do not exist yet for discography.
Many may disagree with this statement, but the wide variety of approaches
to
discographical data seen everywhere bears this out. Most discographers
prefer to have the method fit the means depending on what they are
working
with. For now, that is probably still neccessary to some degree, due to
the variant types of information that individual reserachers have access
to
given the project under consideration.
Brian Rust style discography, or some varient of it, is
used most commonly of the examples I've seen. Here is a rough
summary:
ARTIST
LOCATION/DATE
Personnel listing
Matrix number -
take Title
(composers) Label/Issue
No.
In your rather unusual case, Piave is the librettist/lyricist. The
opera La Traviata is the metawork from which this excerpt is
drawn,
but
the Duetto "Pura siccome un angelo" is the selection derived from it and
recorded here. "II/5"means that it comes from Act II, Scene
5
of
"La Traviata." "Germont" is the name of a character in the opera. I have no
idea what the "<1>" signifies, unless it is a take
number.
For an Artist entry:
| Premier (mV4) [John H. Bieling (T), Billy
Murray (T), Steve C. Porter (Bar), William F. Hooley (Bs)],
(O) |
This
is odd. "(mV4)" is used in place of the word "Quartet" to signify a male vocal
quartet. The artist is the Premier Quartet,
and
the designations after the name refer to the vocal ranges involved (2 tenors,
a baritone and a bass.) The "(O)" means that
the
accompaniment is provided by an Orchestra.
One
thing lacking from this entry, as it is provided here, is any information
about the record itself. If there is no matrix, label
or
issue number then it kind of defeats the purpose of discography. I can tell
you that the piece in question was recorded in
1913
or earlier, as John Bieling retired from recording that year owing to a vocal
injury. This group of singers recorded for many
labels under several names.
David N. Lewis
Assistant Classical Editor
All Media
Guide
1168 Oak
Valley Drive
Ann Arbor,
MI 48108
U.S.A
davlew@xxxxxxxxxxxx