english bibliographic terms

abstract

a summary of a book, article, etc.; also called précis

anthology

a representative collection of selected musical or literary works or excerpts

archive

a place in which public or institutional records are systematically preserved, or a repository of any documents or other materials, especially those of historical value

autograph

a document (music manuscript, letter, etc.) written or signed in/by a person’s own hand; thus, a primary source

catalog/catalogue

(physical objects) 1) a list of the contents of a library, book collection, or group of libraries, or 2) a list or index of compositions, usually by a single composer, rather than a collection or a repertory of music

collected works, complete edition

the publication of the entire compositional output of a single composer in a scholarly edition

congress report

a publication containing the texts of the papers read at a congress or conference, either a one-time event on a particular topic, such as an individual composer, or the regular meeting of a society; in the first instance, the report would normally be an independent publications, and in the second, it could be one of a series of such volumes or published in the association’s journal

edition

1) all the impressions of a literary work printed at any time or times from one setting-up of type (excluding a facsimile production), or 2) one of the successive forms: second, revised, enlarged, corrected, etc. in which a work is published either by the author or a subsequent editor, or 3) the presentation of an older musical composition in a version that makes it accessible to modern performers

facsimile

an exact reproduction (but not necessarily the original color or size) of a manuscript or printed source

fair copy

a neat copy of a corrected document

Festschrift

a publication on the occasion of a celebration, or in honor of someone (example: on the occasion of a renowned scholar’s sixtieth birthday), usually consisting of articles by practicing scholars (colleagues, former students, etc.) in the field of the one honored

holograph

a document (music manuscript, letter, etc.) wholly in the handwriting of the author

imprint

the publisher’s name, often with the address and date of publication, placed at the foot of the title page or somewhere else in the book

incipit

the first few notes or words of text used to identify a musical composition

ISBN/ISSN

code numbers in an international identification system first developed in the UK in 1967 and adopted by the US in 1968, the identifying code is placed at t he front of books and serials respectively

journal

1) a generic term to refer to, or sometimes used in the title of, a scholarly periodical, or 2) a diary or daily record of occurrences, transactions, or reflections

magazine

a periodical containing articles, pictures, reviews, advertisements, etc., often of a popular interest and sometimes focusing on a specific subject area, ‘lesser’ form of a journal (because it has pictures and ads)

manuscript

1) a book, document, musical composition, letter, etc., written by hand; 2) an author’s written or typed copy of a work before it is printed; thus a primary source

monument, musical

a scholarly edition of the music of one region or country (Denkmal is the German equivalent)

opus

a creative work, usually a composition, to which a number is assigned by a composer or publisher, to indicate its order in a composer’s written and/or published output (italian: ópera, german: werk, french: œuvre)

periodical

a publication ordinarily with a fixed interval between issues

proceedings

a published report of a conference or meeting of a society or congress, frequently accompanied by abstracts or texts of the papers presented there

reprint edition

a later edition of a work that ordinarily is no longer in print, often issued by another publisher who specializes in these editions, such as Da Capo or Dover

revised edition

a later edition of a work incorporating major revisions by the author or an editor and often supplementary matter designed to bring it up to date

serial

any publication usually appearing at regular intervals, including periodicals, annuals, (yearbooks), newspapers, proceedings, etc. in a series

siglum (pl. sigla)

a letter or letters with or without numbers used to identify a manuscript or printed source, library, or archive

primary source

a composition, letter, or document by a composer, author, or some other person, or any document dating from the historical period in question that gives the words of the witnesses or recorders of an eventse

secondary source

second- or third-hand information and may be based on primary sources

thematic catalogue

a list or index of compositions, usually by a single composer rather than a collection or repertory of music, in which each composition or movement is identified by an incipit

transcription

1) the transliteration of an early work into modern musical notation, or 2) the process or result of adapting a musical composition (usually instrumental) to a medium other than its original one, which may very from little more than a transference from one medium to another to a modification of the original necessitated by the change of medium

union catalogue

a library catalogue listing the holdings of a group of cooperating libraries

urtext

original text, often a prototype from which later variants (texts, compositions, etc.) are derived