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| Oral History of American Music | |
|---|---|
| Name | Oral History of American Music |
| Established | 1969 |
| Location | Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut |
| Type | audio archive, oral history collection |
| Director | Vivian Perlis (founder) |
Oral History of American Music
The Oral History of American Music is an archive and research project documenting composers, performers, scholars, and institutions in United States music history through recorded interviews, transcripts, and related papers. Founded at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut by Vivian Perlis with ties to the Yale School of Music and the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, the project has preserved testimony from figures associated with Gershwin, Copland, Bernstein, Ives, and many other American musical traditions.
The project was initiated in 1969 by Vivian Perlis after interviews with Charles Ives associates that connected to collections at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, supported by grants from organizations including the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts. Early collaborators and advisors included faculty from the Yale School of Music, curators from the Library of Congress, musicologists affiliated with Columbia University, and archivists from the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and the Library of Congress American Folklife Center. The founding era engaged artists and administrators from ensembles and institutions such as the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and the Juilliard School.
The archive contains oral-history interviews, audio recordings, typed transcripts, photographs, letters, and scores connected with composers, performers, and administrators from the 20th century and 21st century United States music scenes. Holdings document careers and networks tied to Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, George Gershwin, Ives family, Elliott Carter, Ruth Crawford Seeger, Samuel Barber, Virgil Thompson, Lou Harrison, Charles Wuorinen, Joan Tower, John Cage, Philip Glass, Steve Reich, Terry Riley, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Mahalia Jackson, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Nina Simone, Aretha Franklin, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Patti Smith, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Stevie Wonder, Prince and others, as well as material connected to institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Institution, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and the Lincoln Center.
Interview protocols emphasize oral testimony, ethical consent, careful indexing, and preservation standards coordinated with the American Folklore Society practices and archival guidelines from the Society of American Archivists. Interviewers have included musicologists from Yale University, Harvard University, Princeton University, Rutgers University, and performers connected to the New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and Los Angeles Philharmonic. Techniques combine long-form life-history interviews, follow-up sessions documenting premieres and recordings at venues like Carnegie Hall, Avery Fisher Hall, Metropolitan Opera House, and recollections tied to festivals such as the Tanglewood Music Festival and the Newport Jazz Festival.
The collection features interviews with eminent composers and performers such as Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, Elliott Carter, John Cage, Philip Glass, Steve Reich, Joan Tower, Lou Harrison, Samuel Barber, Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bob Dylan, Paul Simon, Joni Mitchell, Aretha Franklin, Prince, Stevie Wonder, Patti Smith, and scholars like William Schuman collaborators and musicologists affiliated with Howard Taubman and the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Contributors to the project's scholarship and growth include curators from the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, directors from the Yale School of Music, and grantmakers from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Guggenheim Foundation.
Materials from the archive have informed books, documentary films, recorded anthologies, and curated exhibitions at institutions such as the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library, the Yale University Art Gallery, the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of American History, the Library of Congress, and festival programs at Tanglewood and the Newport Jazz Festival. Published works drawing on the collection include biographies and studies involving Vivian Perlis and collaborators, analyses featuring Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, George Gershwin, and monographs circulated through university presses at Yale University Press, Oxford University Press, and Cambridge University Press.
The archive supports seminars, curriculum modules, workshops, and public lectures with partners at the Yale School of Music, Yale University, the Beinecke Library, the Smithsonian Institution, and community organizations including the New Haven Museum. Outreach has extended to students and educators through collaborations with the Juilliard School, New England Conservatory, Berklee College of Music, and public programming at Carnegie Hall and the Lincoln Center.
The project has influenced scholarship on American composers, performers, and musical institutions, informing research at universities such as Yale University, Harvard University, Columbia University, Princeton University, and Rutgers University and contributing oral documentation cited in studies of jazz, blues, gospel, popular music, and contemporary classical music. Its legacy is evident in archival standards adopted by the Society of American Archivists, citation in monographs on figures like Aaron Copland, Leonard Bernstein, John Cage, Philip Glass, Miles Davis, and Bob Dylan, and in curricular materials used across conservatories and music departments nationwide.
Category:Archives in the United States Category:Yale University Category:Musicology