College and Research Libraries


By H E L E N G . H A U C K 

The Use of Phonograph Records 
in the Junior College 
Miss Hauck, librarian of Blackburn Col-
lege, Carlinville, Illinois, read this paper 
at the Junior College Libraries Section of 
the A.C.R.L. on June 24, in Boston. 

WHEN I was asked to prepare a paper on the subject of the use of phono-
graph records in the junior college, it was 
suggested that the use made of records 
in the twenty-three junior colleges who 
had been recipients of Carnegie Music 
Sets might be the nucleus for the paper. 
These colleges were queried as to the use 
of their phonograph record collections, the 
means of encouraging that use, and the 
reaction of students to the program. Five 
of the librarians did not reply to my letter, 
and only ten of those replying gave any 
specific information. Hence, much of my 
paper will of necessity be quite general. 

J u d g i n g from the replies received, only 
four colleges had record collections prior to 
the receipt of their Carnegie sets. I learned, 
to my surprise, that even though the ten 
original allocations of Carnegie Music Sets 
to junior colleges were an outgrowth of 
the Advisory Group on Junior -College 
Libraries, only six libraries haVe jurisdic-
tion over the sets. Because the libraries 
do not have the proper housing facilities, 
the collections are being cared for by the 
departments of music. 

In the schools where the departments of 
music administer the sets, the record col-
lections are having regular use in the 

classes of theory and appreciation. Enroll-
ment in appreciation classes has been re-
ported doubled since these large antholo-
gies of recorded music have been made 
available. Almost all the colleges have 
regular listening periods scheduled, and 
the entire student body is welcomed to 
enjoy the recordings. Students of musical 
instruments take advantage of the oppor-
tunity to check points of interpretation 
with the records of great artists. A vio-
linist may take this means of practising 
with an orchestra. Ability to read scores 
is being developed among the nonmusic 
students. Regular concerts are being 
given, and these programs are often made 
up from student requests. Music instruc-
tors act as commentators for some of 
the programs. One college reported that 
only a small group of music students ex-
hibited a continuous interest in the record-
ings. All the other schools felt that a 
large proportion of the students were 
regular listeners. U n d e r the department 
of music supervision there is little develop-
ing of the original Carnegie collections 
except in the field of music. 

Sqpie-jaf the junior colleges, particularly 
those in which the record collections are 
under library supervision, are extending 
the use of their collections far beyond the 
field of music. I t is this phase of the use 
of records in the junior colleges that I 
wish to discuss in more detail. I shall 
approach the subject by telling you of 

SEPT EMBER, 1941 
395 



the use of the record collection in the 
Blackburn College Library, because I 
know more about it than any other. 

T h e Blackburn collection antedates by 
several years the receipt of the Carnegie 
Music Set. T h e collection had its begin-
ning outside of the library in the depart-
ments of English, French, German, and 
Spanish. Several language series had been 
purchased for class use, and the head of 
the department of English had secured 
some records to be used in the teaching of 
modern poetry. H e r personal collection 
of recordings of early English music and 
Shakespearian songs inspired us to request 
that a Carnegie Music Set be allocated to 
Blackburn College. 

Before the arrival of the Carnegie set in 
November 1939, plans were made to house 
it in a room in the library, placing it 
entirely under the supervision of the 
library. T h e stray records over the cam-
pus were collected; the English instruc-
tor donated the recordings of poetry and 
English songs; and the library music room 
was inaugurated, operating under a system 
of voluntary student proctors. Immedi-
ately, student interest reached a surprising 
peak. T h e students approved whole-
heartedly the collection of Carnegie rec-
ords, but they soon compiled a list of 
suggestions for additions. T h e faculty 
likewise had suggestions to offer. 

W e began to peruse the record catalogs 
and to follow the reviews of current re-
leases. W e bought many of the records 
which the students requested. I might 
say in passing that the requests of Black-
burn students for certain compositions 
were almost identical with the requests of 
M a r s Hill College students. About half 
of our purchases have been made with the 
hope of their having classroom use. For 
example, Maurice Evans' albums of Ham-

let and Richard II have been enjoyed in 
both the freshman English and English 
literature classes. W e considered the O r -
son Welles' recordings of the Shakespear-
ian plays, but the students' reaction of 
amusement caused us to decide against 
them. Incidentally, the Welles' record-
ings might be very valuable for high school 
or junior high school literature work. 

M o r e and more of the modern poets are 
making recordings of their poems, and we 
have purchased almost all the available 
recordings for use in the modern poetry 
unit of the freshman English course. In 
our collection the following modern poets 
are represented: De La M a r e , Frost, Lind-
say, Hillyer, Holmes, Auden, and Sand-
burg. W e also have readings from the 
older poets such as Blake, Milton, Shakes-
peare, and W o r d s w o r t h . 

Records of Plays 

Records furnish supplementary material 
for the drama unit of the freshman course. 
Oscar W i l d e ' s Importance of Being Ear-
nest is taught, and the Gielgud cut from 
the play affords lively entertainment. 
James W e l d o n Johnson's reading of The 
Creation ties up with the teaching of 
Green Pastures, as also do the spirituals 
from the Carnegie collection. T h e classes 
in religion have likewise made use of the 
spirituals and the Johnson recordings. 

H a r d y ' s Return of the Native is, as is 
the case in most schools, another unit in 
the freshman course. O n e class hour is 
given to listening to Sir Edmund Gosse's 
tribute to T h o m a s H a r d y . T h e playing 
of this recording serves a dual purpose in 
that a note taking exercise is made of it. 
A f t e r discussion of the subject of note tak-
ing, a check is made by the use of the 
Gosse lecture, to see whether the students 
are actually able to take intelligent notes. 

328 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES 



D u r i n g the past school year as interest 
in the use of records developed, three 
instructors have used some of their depart-
mental library appropriations for the pur-
chase of records. T h e German instructor 
considers the complete recording of M o -
zart's The Magic Flute to be one of the 
finest examples of German diction. These 
M o z a r t albums were purchased, the li-
bretto dittoed, and the students of German 
have spent hours in the classroom and in 
the library music room listening to The 
Magic Flute. T h e German Lieder of 
the original Carnegie set are also fre-
quently used in the German classes. One 
cannot deny that this is a pleasant and 
painless bit of ear training. 

Recordings in French 

A number of foreign recordings in 
French have been selected. Scenes from 
Moliere, Corneille, and Rostand offer ex-
cellent opportunity for ear training. T h e r e 
is a new recording of a dramatization of 
Guy de Maupassant's The Necklace to be 
played after the French classes have read 
the story. A Sacha Guitry album is one 
of the most delightful bits representative 
of modern French culture which one could 
hope to find. T h e musical settings of this 
album add much to the listener's enjoy-
ment. W e have not been above stooping 
to swing, surprisingly enough. Because 
of the clarity of diction, the recent record-
ing of the popular selection Les enfants 
s'ennuient le dimanche has been added to 
the collection. Students other than those 
of the French classes have learned of this 
record, and the librarian has had to refuse 
requests to borrow the record for the 
weekly "teasers," fifty-minute dances to 
recorded music. 

T h e department of English has been 
buying regularly anything thought to be 

useful for class instruction. Songs, whose 
lyrics have been written by Blake, T h o m a s 
Moore, M a t t h e w Arnold, Tagore, W o r d s -
worth, or have been taken from the Rubai-
yat, are used in the English literature 
classes. T h e head of the department 
planned an interesting feature, a series 
of music-literature programs, which util-
ized every possible record in our collection, 
and which were given not as part of the 
class work, but as entertainment for the 
entire campus. T h e r e were programs 
with titles such as these: M o d e r n P o e t r y ; 
T h e Nineteenth C e n t u r y ; Gilbert and 
Sullivan; Hamlet; Richard II; Romeo 
and Juliet; Midsummer Night's Dream; 
and the Merry Wives of Windsor; Shakes-
pearean Songs; Sixteenth and Seventeenth 
Century English Songs; American, Eng-
lish, Gaelic, and Welsh Folk Songs; and 
there were longer programs for the play-
ing of the entire recordings of W a g n e r ' s 
Tristan und Isolde, Gounod's Faust, and 
Berlioz's The Damnation of Faust. 

Phonographs 

O u r records may be played on a small 
phonograph which has been provided for 
classroom use, or an instructor may bring 
his class to the library music room, where 
the excellent Carnegie instrument affords 
magnificent reproduction for all types of 
records. Instructors are urged to make 
use of the better machine, and to have their 
students enjoy the pleasant, informal at-
mosphere of the music room. 

A t Blackburn we have no department 
of music, and I think the students have 
a greater sense of appreciation and grati-
tude because they are lacking the advan-
tage of formal musical education. T h e 
members of our college choir have been 
ardent listeners to all the choral selections, 
and the interest of the entire student body 

SEPT EMBER, 1941 
397 



has been phenomenal. All the operas, 
symphonies, concertos, and the Messiah 
have been played many times in their en-
tirety. Any Sunday afternoon concert or 
daily chapel concert has been received with 
the greatest of approval. 

O n e of our young English instructors, a 
former Rhodes scholar, owned an exten-
sive collection of records, which he had 
obtained abroad. T h e majority of his 
records were of early music and quite rare. 
T h i s instructor also had an unusual col-
lection of art reproductions. Both col-
lections were used in class, and he also 
gave a series of lectures synchronizing the 
history of music and art. For example, 
while presenting early Gothic art, music of 
Leonin was played, or while discussing the 
transition from the Gothic to the Renais-
sance, selections from Josquin des Pres 
were offered, or making a great jump, 
while showing a Renoir, Debussy or Ravel 
supplied the musical setting. A similar 
idea has been recently developed in the book 
entitled Music in History, by H o w a r d 
D . McKinney and W . R . Anderson. 

N o w I shall tell you what is being done 
with record collections in some of the 
other junior colleges. Undoubtedly you 
have read in a recent issue of the Junior 
College Journal the article about the cor-
relating of music with history, literature, 
and the visual arts at Green M o u n t a i n 
College. T w o colleges, Stephens and 
Frances Shimer, are making extensive use 
of their record collections in their humani-
ties survey course. In most schools the 
Elizabethan songs are played in literature 
classes. Club groups are grateful for the 
opportunity of having records for their 
programs. A t M a r s Hill College, a music 
identification contest was sponsored and 
voted a success. O n many campuses rec-
ords are supplying the musical settings for 

dramatic productions. Colleges are exert-
ing wider influence in their communities 
by sharing their recordings with those 
outside of the colleges. Civic clubs, public 
school classes, and private groups are being 
given the pleasure of using the college 
collections. T h e recently published 
pamphlet, Memorandum on the Use of 
Art and Music Study Material, prepared 
by Florence Anderson for the Carnegie 
Corporation of N e w York, tells of this 
enriching influence observed in the col-
leges and universities who have been the 
fortunate recipients of music sets. 

I had expected that some information 
regarding the use of records in speech 
classes would be forthcoming, but no li-
brarian mentioned that aspect. At Black-
burn we offer no work in speech. I feel 
certain, though, that records do have, or 
could have, great use in this field. 

Cataloging 

A word about the cataloging of records 
at Blackburn. T h e Carnegie sets are ar-
ranged in a simple but satisfactory man-
ner, and the cataloging by composer, title, 
medium, and form serves perfectly. W e 
have followed the Carnegie system, adding 
the form division "Poetry and Readings" 
under which we have placed all our mis-
cellaneous group of drama, poetry, et 
cetera. T o the label of the composer file 
we have added the word " a u t h o r , " making 
it possible to file the author entries therein. 
W e also have made a shelflist of the col-
lection because of the aid it would be in 
checking. Checking the collection is a 
necessary procedure because our students 
have such free access to the collection. 

A t Francis Shimer the original collec-
tion of records was classified according to 
the scheme worked out and used at Smith 
College, and nothing has yet been done 

330 COLLEGE AND RESEARCH LIBRARIES 



about combining the older collection with 
the Carnegie set, but at some f u t u r e date 
the older records will probably be reclassed 
according to the simpler scheme. N o r t h 
Park's original collection is also being 
kept separate from the Carnegie set. 

In most of the junior colleges, the rec-
ords are not being generally circulated to 
the students. T h e departments of music 
fear that records might not be available 
when needed for class. If the records are 
not circulated, it is possible to control the 
type needle used in playing them, thus, per-
haps, prolonging the life of the collection. 
Students of some schools do not have port-
able phonographs on which to play the 
records, and when a school does own a fine 
phonograph, it seems much better to have 
the records played under the best circum-
stances. Perhaps the ideal situation is to 
provide a listening room which is open 
all the time as is done at Stephens and 
Blackburn. All the other colleges have 
made the records available for only a few 
hours each day. 

Aids to a Project 

For the college which lacks the advan-
tage of a large anthology of recorded music 
like a Carnegie set, but which wishes to 
embark on a program involving the use 

of phonograph records, there are valuable 
aids to the project. T h e record shops are 
publishing lists of special interest to col-
lege instructors and librarians. T h e n 
books on the subject are being published. 
Such organizations as the National Coun-
cil of Teachers of English are sponsoring 
recordings. T h e Division of Museum 
Extension of the Museum of Fine Arts of 
Boston is publishing a series of portfolios 
of plates on various subjects. I have used 
two of these, one called Elizabethan Eng-
landand the other the French Renais-
sance. Accompanying these portfolios 
there are excellently written texts, which 
conclude with lists of records illustrating 
the music of the period under discussion. 
W h a t better aid could one have for a 
history, literature, or humanities course? 

Several of the junior college librarians 
have expressed the hope that in the f u t u r e 
their libraries might have record collec-
tions and develop that aspect of library 
service just as the service of books has 
been developed. I cannot help thinking 
that there are great possibilities in this 
field, and that in a short time, with the 
encouragement of the librarians, college 
instructors will more and more utilize the 
vitalizing effect of various types of phono-
graph records in class instruction. 

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