USC Libraries

A new exhibition of materials from the USC University Archives honors the late composer, conductor, and USC Thornton School of Music professor Ingolf Dahl on the 100th anniversary of his birth. Keep reading to learn more about Dahl and the exhibition, located on the second floor of Doheny Memorial Library at the entrance to Special Collections.

The USC Libraries will host an evening of classical music on Tuesday, February 14, in Doheny Memorial Library's second-floor Intellectual Commons. Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Strings Department Midori Goto invites you to celebrate Valentine's Day with violinists from the USC Thornton School of Music, performing solo works by Johann Sebastian Bach.

This week, scholars from around the world convene at the USC Libraries for the fifth biennial conference of the International Feuchtwanger Society. From Wednesday, September 14 through Friday, September 16, historians, librarians, and other experts will discuss the experiences of the artists, intellectuals, and other German-speaking exiles who fled persecution in Nazi-controlled Europe for the safety of Southern California. Keep reading to learn more about the conference, titled To Stay or Not to Stay? (Bleiben oder Zurück-kehren).

Writing for the Los Angeles Times' Culture Monster blog, Barbara Isenberg recently reported that an archived film score from the USC Cinematic Arts Library has helped recreate the orchestral music of the 1961 film West Side Story. To celebrate the musical's 50th anniversary, this Friday and Saturday the Los Angeles Philharmonic will perform the score live inside the Hollywood Bowl while the film is screened on stage. In restoring the film score for use by a live orchestra, the shows' producers turned to the USC Libraries' Robert Wise Collection for the condensed score used by the film's conductor, Johnny Grant. The score, Isenberg reported, "was the only complete source the Leonard Bernstein Office was able to locate for the restoration."

The USC Libraries have added 33 new electronic resources to support USC's teaching and research needs. By mid-July, USC students, faculty, and staff will be able to access to the new databases, electronic journals, and other digital resources through the E-Resources tab on the USC Libraries homepage.

The USC Libraries' Seventh Annual Wonderland Award was featured today on the USC News website. Since 2005, the annual interdisciplinary competition has showcased students' creative and interpretive skills and encouraged new work related to the nineteenth-century English polymath Lewis Carroll. This year's winners were USC students Veronique Van Pelt and Andrei Pavelescu. Keep reading to learn more about the contest and the winning entries.

USC Thornton School of Music student Veronique Van Pelt is the winner of the USC Libraries' Seventh-Annual Wonderland Award. In an April 21 ceremony inside Doheny Memorial Library, Van Pelt won the top prize of $2,000 for her musical album, The Alice Sketches: Songs About Lewis Carroll, Alice Liddell, the Wonderland Stories and the Present. The album was selected from a strong field of 32 imaginative entries, created by students from USC and other participating universities. Andrei Pavelescu, a doctoral candidate at the USC Dornsife College, took home the second-place prize of $1,500 for his inventive take on the children's card game of Go Fish. Photos from the Wonderland Award ceremony appear after the jump.

More than one hundred finding aids for the USC Libraries' archival collections are now available online. These finding aids, which provide basic information about the collections as well as detailed inventories of the collections' contents, help researchers discover the riches of the libraries' archival collections. Keep reading for a list of available finding aids, organized by subject area.

Richard J. Bing, an accomplished cardiologist, composer and author, died Nov. 8 at the age of 101. Bing was a longtime professor of medicine at USC who, in 2000, donated the Richard J. Bing Collection of Music Scores to the USC Libraries. Keeping reading for the USC News article about Bing and his collection of musical compositions.

On Thursday, November 4, the USC Libraries hosted an opening reception for Paderewski: The Modern Immortal, a new exhibition celebrating the 150th birthday of the great Polish musician, statesman, and humanitarian Ignacy Jan Paderewski. Photos from the reception, which featured remarks from both Dean Catherine Quinlan of the USC Libraries and Director Marek Zebrowski of the Polish Music Center at the USC Thornton School of Music, appear after the jump.