Every Thursday from 1pm-2pm in November 2025
This November, the Events & Training Committee present a series of talks, covering promoting archives, cataloguing the music way, exploring music and its healing properties. Covering the physical, spiritual and practical side of being responsible for music and reaching its audiences, and offering a taster of things to come at Cardiff Annual Study Weekend 2026!
All sessions are free to attend. Webinars will be recorded and archived for members here. Please complete booking form with expressions of interest and links will be sent out in due course.
6 November – The Manchester effect: Halle to Watson, a bibliographic adventure
With Ros Edwards, Senior Librarian, Henry Watson Music Library; and Guest speaker from the Royal Northern College of Music.
13 November – Music, Dementia and Technology: developing new ways of engaging with music for dementia care
With Prof. Renee Timmers, Muses Mind Machine research centre, University of Sheffield.
“The aim of the Music, Dementia and Technology project (MDT) was to develop technology that supports the engagement with music in people with dementia. During the project, we worked closely with care providers (dementia cafes), people with dementia and their carers to better understand what such new technology could look like, what functions it would serve, and how it can be used to support musical engagement and wellbeing. This co-design process led to the development of relatively simple technology that was nevertheless powerful in its effect. In this presentation, I will outline what technology was developed, how it can be used, and what we have found so far about how it can support engagement and enjoyment of music, and its potential effects on wellbeing.”
20 November – The Alice Sound – From library to concert hall, home and school: Paul Rissmann’s Alice concert suites for young audiences:
With Prof. Kiera Vaclavik, Director of the Centre for Childhood Cultures, Queen Mary University of London.
In this talk, professor Kiera Vaclavik (QMUL) will give a tour of the Alice Sound website, the main outcome of a project with the London Symphony Orchestra funded by the AHRC which started life thanks to a chance encounter with a Victorian music sheet in the British Library. She will highlight, in particular, the ways that Victorian material is woven through the website and indicate the many ways in which the music and resources freely available on the site can be used.
27 November – Printed music cataloguing: a short introduction (booking via CILIP)
With Meg Fisher and Caroline Shaw (British Library).
What do we mean by scores, parts and arrangements? Why are preferred titles so important in music? What is a piano reduction? The International Association of Music Libraries’ UK branch has a new course – ‘Music Cataloguing for Beginners’ – which takes cataloguers and non-cataloguers alike through the basics of music cataloguing, including basic scores, instrumental sets, vocal music and audiovisual materials. In this session, we will guide you through week one of this course. By the end of the session, you should be able to identify different score formats, describe some of the differences between book and music cataloguing, and create a MARC record for a solo piano piece. No prior experience in music cataloguing required, but an understanding of book cataloguing – including MARC fields – would be useful. Bookings are free for CILIP members and for IAML (UK & Irl) members using the code IAML-5.