Characteristics of the literature used by English musicologists

Abstract

A total of 7433 footnote references from articles in three English musicological journals— Music and letters, Music review and Proceedings of the Royal Musical Association over the period 1965 to 1974 were analysed according to form of publication (manuscript or printed), bibliographical form, place and date of publication and, where appropriate, lan guage. The articles from which the data was gathered were also analysed according to country, century and composer with which they were primarily concerned. References to periodical articles were also analysed separately according to frequency of citation within the three journals. To complement the footnote analysis, a questionnaire was sent to a re presentative selection of English musicologists asking them to specify which materials they used in the preparation of their periodical articles. The results of the two surveys are discussed in the context of bibliometric research in other areas as well as present-day musical scholarship itself. Attention is drawn to those biblio graphical forms which, for no apparent reason, appear to be under used. Suggestions are made as to the practical uses the results of the study could have for librarians and musicologists.