co-funded by the European Commission

What happens to that live concert you just heard on the radio?

Or to those unique ethnological recordings made during long arduous expeditions?

Their final destination is a shelf in one of many professional music archives. Music archives are home to priceless music audio, including 78s and other rare and historical recordings. Archives are held by broadcasters, museums, institutions or private collectors.

Music archives collect the cultural heritage of a people or nation. Archive collections often also contain videos, books, documents, manuscripts and musical instruments. All are part of Europe’s cultural audio-treasure chest.

Information about the music and the recordings is collected and stored as metadata in a database catalogue. These catalogues are the access point to the musical treasure chest.

Each archive is an island with it’s own character. Archives have their own individual languages. Their digital catalogues have been created in different formats. Their data is based on different technologies. Users can search the catalogues only one by one. They have to pay a separate visit to each archive.

Archives need special support to enable them to deliver their input to the culture of an emerging Europe. DISMARC, a two-year EU-funded project initiated in September 2006, addresses the problem. Global perspectives are converging in science, education and entertainment.

Participating archives and collections will contribute their catalogue data.

This data will be transformed into a universally- readable format.

The result? All these different catalogues will be simultaneously searchable Online searches can be made by anybody, from anywhere. This service will be available in more than 20 languages. for the first time!

The DISMARC portal is the key to this access, and will be ready for public use by the end of the project in 2008.

The ten partners in DISMARC are:

RUNDFUNK BERLIN-BRANDENBURG RBB is the regional public broadcaster in Berlin and Brandenburg, operating one regional television channel, seven radio stations and a wide range of online and videotext services. RBB also contributes to national channels, runs the ARD Warsaw studio and manages the ARD Play-Out-Centre with 17 television and 22 radio channels. Digital audio content: 300,000 items / 5,200 hours Analogue audio content: 233,000 items / 1,200 hours Consortium leader, content provider, Work Package leader for ‘Management’ and ‘Dissemination’ WPs GERMANY

ETHNOMUSICOLOGY, MEDIA-TECHNOLOGY AND BERLIN PHONOGRAMME ARCHIVE EMEM is part of Staatliche Museen Berlin’s Ethnological Museum. Collects, preserves and researches music worldwide and communicates knowledge via exhibitions and publications. Their wax cylinder collection has been included in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register since Digital audio content: 357 collections / 738 hours Analogue audio content: 717 collections / 8,500 hours Content provider, Work Package leader for ‘Data’ WP GERMANY

ANGEWANDTE INFORMATIONSTECHNIK FORSCHUNGSGESELLSCHAFT AIT is a software / research / information management company specialising in information engineering and development of information systems. Provides know-how and technical infrastructure for a variety of EU- funded projects. Technology provider, Work Package leader ‘Technical ‘WP AUSTRIA

GRIEG MUSIC EDUCATION GME develops and distributes internet-based education systems and educational content. Customers are primary and secondary schools, colleges and universities. Dissemination, pilot projects NORWAY

WOMEX WOMEX is the premier network exclusively dedicated to world, roots, folk, ethnic, traditional, local and diaspora music of all kinds. Their annual tradeshow/ conference/ festival connects music business, culture and science. Dissemination, Work Package leader ‘Pilot Projects’ WP GERMANY

HOCHSCHULE FÜR MUSIK UND THEATER HANNOVER HMTH is a leading German artistic / educational / research university. Among the 20 subjects offered are ethnomusicology and music pedagogy. Affiliated institutes include the European Centre for Jewish Music, the World Music Study Centre, Institute for Journalistic and Communication Research. Digital audio content: 7000 CDs / 4,000 hours Analogue audio content: recordings / 38,000 hours Content provider GERMANY

YLEISRADIO YLE is Finland's national public service broadcasting company, with five national television channels, seven radio channels and twenty-five regional radio programmes. Digital audio content: 24,000 items / 70,000 hours Analogue audio content: 710,000 recordings / 250,000 hours Content provider FINLAND

SVENSKT VISARKIV SVA is part of the Swedish National Collections of Music. An important part of SVA’s activities is research and editorial work, aimed at making archived material accessible to scholars and to the general public. Digital audio content: 3,800 items / 4,400 hours Analogue audio content: 45,500 items / 34,600 hours. Content provider, technical support SWEDEN

INSTITUTE OF ART OF THE POLISH ACADEMY OF SCIENCES ISPAN is a research institution which concentrates on interdisciplinary studies of Polish art and artistic culture, architecture, music, film, theatre and fine arts. Digital audio content: 621 hours Analogue audio content: 4,950 hours Content provider POLAND

SOAS is the only higher education institution in the UK specialising in the study of Asia and Africa. Part of the University of London. SOAS recently began operating the in-house radio station OpenAir Radio. Digital audio content:1,950 items / 5,500 hours Analogue audio content:1,600 items Content provider SCHOOL OF ORIENTAL AND ASIAN STUDIES – UNIVERSITY OF LONDON UK

DISMARC partner databases provide data describing their music and music-related content, known as metadata. Technical overview

This metadata is converted to a searchable DISMARC format. The metadata is harvested with a virtual digital vacuum cleaner and is stored in the ‘ metastore ‘.

Other repositories also provide metadata from their catalogues...

Users search the metastore…

The search results give immediate access to all catalogue information. To dig deeper (to listen, license, research, compare), the user can follow a direct link to the DISMARC partner archives.

DISMARC opens a window to the archives  making archive holdings globally searchable for all, 24 hours/day,  enabling multi-lingual online access to all catalogue data via the DISMARC portal, by

 enabling archives to communicate their holdings and content widely, quickly and cheaply, to each other as well as to the general public.  offering a selection of downloadable music via the DISMARC portal. and also by

 create a (free) interactive DVD Guide to the DISMARC collection,  support professional exploitation and performance of music with an easy to handle online licensing tool,  make radio broadcasts with as-yet unexposed recordings,  create a series of themed music projects, available as download or CD. To establish DISMARC, the partners will:

Music education will benefit from DISMARC Series of academic seminars will focus on changes to the academic environment as a result of DISMARC. The DISMARC portal will be adapted as an educational tool and incorporated in the ‘Portfolio Music‘ software.

Audio archives gain more relevance  The preservation and reuse of cultural heritage audio is supported and encouraged by public use of DISMARC.  Europe’s research communities will benefit from a complete overview of each others holdings.

DISMARC is not an island in itself  The software is affordable and sustainable - it uses distributed server technology and easy-to- obtain Open Source software.  The technology complies with the Open Archives Initiative, which increases ease of access.

 DISMARC will foster partnerships and strengthen scientific cooperation.  Digital catalogues which are available for download and content aggregation will benefit from the existence of the DISMARC standard.  and more… DISMARC is not an island in itself

The DISMARC results will be integrated into The European Library (TEL) and the European Digital Library (EDL) as part of the i2010 Initiative. The European Library and the i2010: Digital Libraries Initiative TEL provides a single gateway to the collections of Europe‘s national libraries, and EDL will build upon the TEL infrastructure.

DISMARC will be fully compatible with TEL/EDL and will be integrated into future developments as the TEL/EDL ‘audio pillar’.

Greetings from the DISMARC team The kick-off meeting was held on Sept 28/ at the Deutsches Musikarchiv in Berlin, GermanyDeutsches Musikarchiv

co-funded by the European Commission