LibGuides: MUS 221: History of Western Music (Annandale): Books

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Finding Books by Browsing

Browsing Books in the Library

College libraries use the Library of Congress classification system to organize the books on our shelves, which is a different way of organizing books than most public and school libraries use. If you want to browse the shelves on your campus library, music books are generally in the M section, with the following subcategories.

Music History (mostly classical & Western)	ML160 - ML197
Composers and Musicians	ML385 - ML429
Musical Instruments	ML460 - ML1083; MT170 - MT810
Forms & Ensembles (e.g., sonata, string quartets, opera)	ML1700s MT95 - MT100
World Music	ML198 - ML360.6; ML3565 - ML3776 ML3798
Popular Music History & Criticism Jazz Blues Rap/Hip Hop Rock	ML3469 - ML3541; ML3918 ML3506-ML3508 ML3521 ML3531 ML3534
Vocal Music/Voice	ML1400s; MT820 - MT949
Physiological & psychological aspects	ML3820 - ML3840
Music Theory	MT6 - MT7
Music Notation & Composition	MT35 - MT67
Listeners' Guides	MT90 - MT145

NOTE: This list is a just a general guide. Use the library catalog to search for specific topics.

Sample Searches

Searching for Books in the Library Catalog

If browsing doesn't work for you or you want to jump straight into searching for books, here are some tips for searching in the Library Catalog.

Sample Searches:

*beethoven AND biography*	Use AND between two or more terms to find materials with all the terms.
rock music OR punk music	Use OR between similar terms. Searching for rock music OR punk music will find books that refer to either term. You must capitalize OR.
*"music theory"*	Use quotation marks ( " " ) around specific phrases such as "music theory" to find the words in that specific order.
music*	Use an asterisk ( * ) to find multiple endings of one word. Using sing* as a search term will include results that refer to music, musical, musicals, musician, musicians, and musicology.

Here is a link to a video discussing how to search for sources in the Library Catalog.

Searching the Catalog: Print Books
This tutorial explains how to limit your results to print books when searching the NOVA Libraries catalog
Searching the Catalog: eBooks
This tutorial explains how to limit your results to ebooks when searching the NOVA Libraries catalog.

Search the Library Catalog

eBooks

These databases are included in the Library Catalog "Books & eBooks" search, but by using the individual databases you will get more powerful search options.

EBSCO eBook Collection This link opens in a new window
A collection of eBooks curated by NOVA librarians on a variety of different subjects. eBooks can be accessed in the browser or downloaded for offline use. (NVCC)
Coverage includes over 21,000 eBooks from the early 1900s to today; New titles added monthly.
Subjects span nearly every discipline and include both fiction and non-fiction titles.
Oxford Scholarship Online eBooks This link opens in a new window
Oxford Scholarship Online offers full-text access to scholarly works from key disciplines in the humanities, social sciences, science, medicine, and law. Select "Unlocked" and "Free" to view the full-text books. (VIVA)