Tips on Using RILM

Language of Publication

Sometimes search engines provide a large number of hits, not all of which are terribly useful. As an undergraduate student, you will not be expected to deal with material in languages other than English. If you are finding a lot of foreign language sources in your RILM search you may like to go to Advanced Search mode (grey 'Adv Mode' button on LHS of screen), then enter 'English' in the Language field. You can still do a simple keyword search - ignore all the other fields.

Articles in a Collection of Essays

RILM, unlike Music Index, lists articles which are published as chapter in books, as well as periodical articles. Entries for articles like this included a field 'Collection'. To get the full publication details, you will need to do a title search for the collection as well as the article.

Example:

A search for English language sources with keywords 'nozze' and 'Figaro' yields the following record:

Title: Mozart and two theaters in Josephinian Vienna.
Author: Cole, Malcolm S.
Collection: Opera in context: Essays on historical staging from the late Renaissance to the time of Puccini
Source: [United States]; Portland, OR: Amadeus; pp. 111-145; 1998; Illus., bibliog., list of works, charts, diagr.
Publication Type: article in a collection of essays; ac

A title search for Opera in context yields the following:

Title: Opera in context: Essays on historical staging from the late Renaissance to the time of Puccini.
Author: Radice, Mark A.
Source: [United States]; Portland, OR: Amadeus 1998; 410 p. ISBN: 1-57467-032-8.
Publication Type: book of collected essays, letters or documents; bc

The full bibliographic citation for the article would be

Cole, Malcolm S. 'Mozart and two theatres in Josephinian Vienna'. Opera in context: Essays on historical staging from the late Renaissance to the time of Puccini. Ed. Mark A. Radice. Portland, OR: Amadeus, 1998. 111-145.