Libraries and Other Student Resources
LIBRARIES AND RESEARCH RESOURCES
The Mina Rees Library at the Graduate Center houses a music collection that concentrates on research and reference tools and contains a rich body of source materials on microfilm. The Music Department liason to the library is Men-Sze Butt (Cataloging Librarian), who can be contacted at 212-817-7072 or mbutt@gc.cuny.edu. It is supplemented by extensive and comprehensive collections at the senior colleges. In addition, the Music Division of the Library of the Performing Arts of The New York Public Library, one of the world's greatest music libraries, is at Lincoln Center, only fifteen minutes by bus or subway from the Graduate Center.
Students enrolled at the GC have borrowing privileges at all twenty CUNY libraries, which house over six million volumes, 31,000 journal/periodical titles, and many resources available on microform and CD-ROM. They may return books, unless they are more than six weeks overdue, at any CUNY college. Renewals of books can be made only at the lending library; fines on overdue books can be paid at any system library (except Bronx Community and Hostos Community colleges and the Law School). The entrance to the GC's Mina Rees Library is on the first floor and is only open to CUNY students. An on-line public access catalog (CUNY+) permits users to determine the location and circulation status of nearly every book and periodical held by CUNY. Students and faculty can search CUNY+ from within any CUNY library, from many department and program offices, via the Mina Rees Library Web site (http://library.gc.cuny.edu), and from home. The site explains the library's hours and borrowing policy, hosts 60 full-text and citation databases and has may useful links and other services; it also provides interactive forms for making Interlibrary Loan (ILL) requests, renewing GC books, asking reference questions, and requesting library instruction. ILL arrangements make it possible to obtain material held in other collections throughout North America and the world. (When their research requires it, CUNY students and faculty may gain on-site access to collections at any of over 250 libraries in the New York City area using the "METRO card." For more information, inquire at the Library.)
One of the greatest storehouses of information and research material anywhere is the Humanities and Social Sciences Library of The New York Public Library (NYPL), located just ten minutes north of the GC, on Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Streets. Faculty and students at the GC may secure a place to work in the Wertheim Study, located on the second floor of the NYPL where they are able to get material specially delivered to them, to keep most books on a designated reserve shelf for one month, and to enjoy a private place to study. If interested, students should take current GC ID to the Office of Special Collections in (NYPL) Room 316. Any member of the public has access to the noncirculating resources of NYPL; users can discover more about its abundant holdings by searching on-site catalogs (for material acquired before 1971) or CATNYP (an on-line public access catalog for material added to the collection after 1971). Older material is being gradually added to CATNYP: currently 2 million records for titles catalogued prior to 1972 have been added. Information about all branches of the NYPL is available at htttp://www.nypl.org.
Please note that Brooklyn (http://www.brooklynpubliclibrary.org) and Queens (http://www.queenslibrary.org) have independent public library systems.
OTHER STUDENT RESOURCES
At the Graduate Center's Barry S. Brook Center for Music Research and Documentation, a large number of national and international projects, publications, and research centers that have their headquarters, providing doctoral students with the opportunity to do research and gain professional experience in various specialties.
Graduate Center students also have access to The Metropolitan Museum of Art's renowned collection of some 4,000 musical instruments for study in association with courses in iconography and organology.
The City University Computer Center, one of the largest and most versatile in the academic world, is available to students and faculty. The electronic music studios at the senior colleges are also available resources, including the Graduate Center Computer Music Lab, outfitted with a Macintosh G4-based Pro Tools / Digital Performer digital audio workstation.
The concentration in ethnomusicology is supported by a well-equipped laboratory for transcription and analysis and works closely with the UNESCO/International Music Council project, The Universe of Music: a History (formerly Music in the Life of Man), now based at the Graduate Center. Other available resources include The Institute for Studies in American Music (ISAM) at Brooklyn College and the Louis Armstrong Archive at Queens College.
Many vocal and instrumental groups, at both the Graduate Center and the senior colleges, are accessible to doctoral students for performances of their works, for performance practice research, and for practical experience in ethnic and non-Western ensembles. Numerous concerts by distinguished guest artists as well as by faculty and students (and student composers) are offered at the Graduate Center throughout the year.