1 July 2024 through 30 June 2025
Overview
In 2024−25, RILM remained strong and forward-looking, sustaining stable productivity across all areas while entering a period of renewal, marked by key staff transitions and strategic new hires. The year marked a significant milestone with the launch of two major new products—DEUMM Online and the RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines—broadening RILM’s offerings and reaffirming its leadership in global music research, now also as a content provider.All RILM resources and projects saw meaningful progress. RILM Abstracts has remained robust and active; ten full-text journals were added on 1 July 2024, with eight more slated for summer 2025. RILM Music Encyclopedias welcomed three new encyclopedias. The Index to Printed Music has been evolving into the RILM Index to Scores and Collected Editions (RISE), with a notable increase in records and expanded scope that now includes digital editions and materials beyond the Western classical canon. MGG Online also continued to grow steadily in content and functionality. The thesaurus and authority records grew exponentially, supporting improved metadata and discoverability across platforms. RILM’s technology team had a transformative year, modernizing infrastructure, retiring legacy systems, and laying a strong foundation for long-term innovation and scalability. The year concluded on a high note with RILM’s accreditation as a civil society partner under the 2005 UNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions, a milestone that affirms RILM’s role in the international cultural policy landscape and expands its global network.
RILM Abstracts of Music Literature (with Full Text)
Overview: RILM Abstracts continues to be the core of RILM’s operations, with steady progress and increased stability through the contributions of new editors and external collaborators, particularly in underrepresented languages such as Japanese, Arabic, Turkish, Hindi, and Bengali. RILM’s participation in the 2025 EBSCO Bibliographic Database Summit confirmed its leadership among peer databases, especially in multilingual metadata practices. Strategic international partnerships have strengthened RILM’s global presence: RILM’s collaboration with the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris has led to public bibliographies, expanded visibility through SUDOC, and presentations at international conferences. Talks are underway with Sultan Qaboos University in Oman for further collaboration. In Pakistan, a concluded partnership with the National College of Arts in Lahore resulted in 144 new records. The partnership with the Archive and Research Center for Ethnomusicology in Gurugram is ongoing. Looking ahead, expanding the role of AI across RILM products is a key priority, with applications in abstracting, indexing, and reference collection.
Annual growth of RILM Abstracts: In 2024–25, 86,697 new bibliographic records were added to the database. Editors indexed 53,379 records. These are the highest numbers since 2021–22. The increase is due to the hiring of two new editors, though their training is not yet completed. Another stimulus is the shift in management strategy for RILM Abstracts, with some greater emphasis on adding and editing records. RAFT may have also contributed to the rise in numbers, with the addition of new journals and the focus of getting the new records checked, edited, and indexed.
Indexing: The following headwords were used during 2024–25 for the first time:
- Afghani music (outside Afghanistan)
- Arab music (outside the Arab world)
- Estonian music (outside Estonia)
- Guinea-Bissauan music (outside Guinea-Bissau)
- instrument builders–bariton oboe
- instrument builders–chalumeau
- instrument builders–fagottino
- instrument builders–Irish harp
- instrument builders–leiqin
- instrument builders–mbira
- instrument builders–portative organ
- instrument builders–saw
- instrument builders–tuba
- instrument builders–udu
- Madagascan music (outside Madagascar)
- Maronite music (outside Lebanon)
- Palestinian music (outside Palestine)
- performers–alto flute
- performers–bass flute
- performers–danso
- performers–duxianhu
- performers–low flute
- performers–snare drum
- performers–spoken word
- performers–taepyeongso
- religion and religious music–Christianity (Coptic)
- religion and religious music–folk beliefs
Full-text coverage overview: The RAFT team had a smooth year, maintaining steady progress across all processing levels, coordinating workflow, and prioritizing materials based on currency and unique status. As of 30 June 2025, iBis contains 598,250 PDFs—an increase of nearly 36,000 records imported since July 2024. This is fewer than in previous years, when the team acquired and processed not only new long-run titles but also a substantial number of loaned gap-filling materials. We are closing the fiscal year with 35,600 unchecked PDFs, including 6,000 unattached reviews. As of 1 July 2025, over 545,000 PDFs are available through EBSCO.
The sixth annual installment of new full-text journals is scheduled for summer 2025. The eight new titles comprise 553 issues/11,922 PDFs, representing seven countries (Austria, Bulgaria, Canada, Italy, Nigeria, Taiwan, and the U.S.) and six languages. Three of these titles will be available online exclusively through RAFT, and two titles come from countries represented in RAFT for the first time.
- Българскомузикознание [B”lgarsko muzikoznanie/Bulgarian musicology]. Sofiâ: B”lgarskata Akademiâ na Naukite, Institut za Izkustvoznanie, 1977–. ISSN 0204-823X
- Canadian winds/Vents canadiens: Journal of the Canadian Band Association/Revue de l’Association canadienne des harmonies. Toronto: Canadian Band Association/Association Canadienne de l’Harmonie, 2002–. ISSN 1703-5295
- Fontes artis musicae. Madison: A-R Editions, 1954–. ISSN 0015-6191
- 関渡音樂學刊 [Guandu yinyue xuekan]/Kuandu music journal. Taibei: Guoli Taibei Yishu Daxue/Taipei National University of the Arts, 2004–. ISSN 1814-1889
- Journal of Christian musicology. Ilé-Ifẹ̀: Obafemi Awolowo University, 2020–. ISSN 2782-8433
- Liuteria, musica e cultura: Organo ufficiale dell’Associazione liutaria italiana. Cremona: Associazione Liuteria Italiana, 2006–. ISSN 1825-7054
- Studi musicali. Firenze: Leo S. Oschki, 1972–2009. ISSN 0391-7789 and eISSN 2037-6413
- Studien zur Musikwissenschaft: Beihefte der Denkmäler der Tonkunst in Österreich. Wien: Hollitzer Wissenschaftsverlag, 2017–. ISSN 0930-9578
Index to Printed Music (IPM)
Overview: IPM had a productive year in anticipation of its upcoming rebrand in fall 2025. With Ian McGorray and Jackie Santos prioritizing accessions of new records, at the end of FY 2025, IPM contains 557,073 published individual piece records (PMs), 10,460 of which include open-access links; 34,160 published CW records; and 1,870 distinct series.
Content: With the upcoming rebrand of IPM to the RILM Index to Scores and Collected Editions (RISE), we want to emphasize that IPM’s historical mission remains unchanged: it will continue to cover printed music editions in collections, sets, and series. What RISE introduces is an expanded scope, incorporating digital editions as well as more materials outside the Western classical sphere where relevant. For example, we have actively worked to include more series from the African continent, including music from South Africa, Nigeria, and Ghana. Assistant Editor Jackie Santos led much of this effort, which also added 28 new languages from the continent to the iBis database.
The volume of new records has significantly increased, helping to reach the goal of 590,000 total records by March 2025—an important milestone in preparation for the rebrand. A key addition was the Repertoire explorer series published by Musikproduktion Höflich, which had previously received limited coverage; over the past year, we accessed 509 CW records from this series, with many PMs attached. We remain committed to keeping current with newly published titles and actively seek open-access materials that fall within the IPM/RISE scope. In the last quarter, we have we intensified efforts to acquire recently published editions to ensure up-to-date coverage of widely distributed complete works editions from major composers and publishers.
EBSCO has confirmed support for two new features critical to the rebrand: (1) the addition of a publisher number field, to appear alongside ISBN and ISMN, and (2) a hyperlinked preferred title field to connect pieces across publishers and editions. We are already including both in our data uploads, and EBSCO is preparing to implement them for the RISE launch.
Several ongoing projects–preferred titles, instrument equivalencies, works with unhelpful and generic titles, IPM collections, display AK records—are aimed at improving IPM/RISE by updating legacy metadata structures from the pre-RILM era. These remnants of the older database’s style and various inconsistencies can cause problems for effective user searching on EBSCOhost and need to be addressed.
RILM Music Encyclopedias (RME)
Content: In January 2025, RILM Music Encyclopedias was expanded to include three new titles, bringing the list of titles to 72, published in print from 1775 to the present, and containing 351,833 entries. The additions included titles that focus on the Balkan region, Latin American music, and music theory, thus reflecting RILM’s global and inclusive mission.
- Sokol Shupol, ed. Biographical dictionary of Balkan composers (Tirana: Asmus, 2005) 704 p.
- Ilan Stavans, ed. Latin music: Musicians, genres, and themes (Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2014) 2 vols., xix, xiv, 923 p.
- David Damschroder and David Russell Williams. Music theory from Zarlino to Schenker: A bibliography and guide (Stuyvesant, NY: Pendragon Press, 1990) xliii, 522 p.
Coming updates and additions:
- Frank Daykin. Encyclopedia of French art song: Fauré, Debussy, Ravel, Poulenc(Hillsdale, NY: Pendragon Press)vi, 739 p. In English.
- Igor de Gandarias. Diccionario de la música en Guatemala (Ciudad de Guatemala: Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala, 2024) xv, 193 p. In Spanish.
- One of Hugo Riemann’s early dictionaries. In German.
MGG Online
Product development: The newly designed Egret search engine, initially launched on DEUMM Online, was introduced to MGG Online in early 2025. In addition to significantly faster performance, it offers more nuanced search results. New user-facing features also include a publication history sorting function and redesigned Browse pages.
Content: Over the past year, MGG Online’s content has been enriched with over 100 articles, encompassing major updates, newly written articles, and new entries. As part of MGG Online’s thematic series on Canada, there are new entries on the city of Montréal, composer and pianist Léo-Paul Morin (1892–1941), and composer and ethnomusicologist Colin McPhee (1900–64). Other highlights include Lorenzo Mattei’s newly written contribution on the southern Italian city of Bari; new entries on German-American composer and pianist Ruth Schonthal (1924–2006) and Swiss composer Dieter Ammann (b.1962); newly written articles on musicologists Claudio Sartori and Thurston Dart. New topical articles explore light music and the concept of the musical star. Articles currently in preparation feature musicians active today, including Romanian soprano Angela Gheorghiu (b.1965), Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja (b.1978), and Italian countertenor Franco Fagioli (b.1981). Further articles on the American mezzo-soprano Susan Graham (b.1960), the American heldentenor Stephen Gould (1962–2023), the Chinese pianist Lang Lang (b.1982), and the American pianist Yuja Wang (b.1987) are in preparation.
DEUMM Online
Four years after RILM acquired the Dizionario enciclopedico universale della musica e dei musicisti (DEUMM), the Italian landmark reference work edited by Alberto Basso, DEUMM Online officially launched in October 2024. This marked a major milestone in expanding global access to one of Italy’s most important music encyclopedias. Now fully digitized and significantly enhanced, DEUMM Online includes expanded content, revised entries, and updated metadata, with new articles in development to reflect ongoing musicological research. The resource exemplifies RILM’s commitment to cultural preservation and dissemination, aligning with the principles of the UNESCO 2005 Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions and the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage. In making this Italian-language resource globally accessible, RILM reinforces its mission to promote linguistic and cultural diversity in music scholarship. In October and November 2024, three launch events took place in Italy. These reflect a renewed scholarly engagement with DEUMM and underscore its evolving role in international musicological discourse. With DEUMM Online, RILM not only preserves but also revitalizes an essential scholarly resource for future generations.
RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines (RAPMM)
The launch of the RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines (RAPMM) in May 2025 marks the culmination of nearly a decade of dedicated research, curation, and development, representing a landmark achievement in documenting popular culture’s history. This digital collection contains a wealth of rare and hard-to-find, independently published popular music magazines and fanzines. Over 125 publications have been fully digitized from their original sources and are now accessible online. This growing collection fills critical gaps in archival offerings. It aligns with the principles of the UNESCO 2003 and 2005 Conventions by preserving and promoting cultural diversity through access to these materials. RAPMM embodies RILM’s commitment to safeguarding cultural heritage and fostering inclusive research methodologies across musical traditions. RAPMM deepens RILM’s mission by complementing its existing resources, providing music researchers with materials that highlight the global impact and evolving narratives of popular culture.
E-Books
Currently, two titles—the third edition of its Manual of Style and Music’s Intellectual History (2009) edited by Zdravko Blažeković and Barbara Dobbs Mackenzie—are available via EBSCOhost Collections Manager and Gobi. Institutions that do not currently subscribe to EBSCO may contact ebookinfo@ebsco.com for additional options, and individuals interested in purchasing the book can contact an affiliated library.
Platforms Hosting RILM Resources
All RILM databases are available by subscription on EBSCOhost or Egret, the RILM platform, or both:
- RILM Abstracts of Music Literature (with Full Text): EBSCOhost
- Index to Printed Music: EBSCOhost
- RILM Music Encyclopedias: EBSCOhost and Egret
- MGG Online: Egret
- DEUMM Online: Egret
- RILM Archive of Popular Music Magazines: Egret
- E-Books: EBSCOhost
Bibliolore
RILM’s blog, Bibliolore, continues to be very active, with new posts every week and increasing numbers of viewers. Bibliolore posts draw from RILM resources, including RILM Music Encyclopedias, MGG Online, DEUMM Online, RILM Abstracts with Full Text, and feature content relevant to global music studies, from Western music to popular music; many are inspired by birthdays, observance days/months, and contemporary topical issues. As in previous years, Bibliolore continues to celebrate musical figures—both well-known ones, like Dolly Parton, Zakir Hussain, Quincy Jones, and Sergio Mendes, as well as less-known artists such as Zitkala Ša, Anna Moffo, and Jose Maceda. Since July 2024, a series of annotated biographies has been published on the music of the Arab world. Done in collaboration with the library of the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, these annotated bibliographies feature youth music, songs of revolutions and popular movements, music in Abbasid Baghdad, Palestine in song, and Arab wedding music.
Here are the top ten posts (hyperlinked with the original posting date) from the past year:
| Post | Views |
|---|---|
| Mahler and Beyoncé (19 October 2011) | 2,421 |
| Paganini and Marfan syndrome (27 October 2022) | 2,368 |
| Smithsonian Collections Object: The Sony TPS-L2 “Walkman” Cassette Player, National Museum of American History (4 March 2020) | 2,080 |
| Debussy and gamelan (22 August 2022) | 1,366 |
| Public Enemy brings the noise (9 April 2024) | 804 |
| The Britannic organ (7 May 2011) | 762 |
| “Asadoya yunta”: An Okinawan song’s history (10 November 2023) | 667 |
| Sly Stone, funk, and Black church aesthetics (15 March 2024) | 659 |
| Central America’s vast dance and musical heritage (26 September 2023) | 651 |
| The contemplative Karnatak singer Jayashri Ramnath (20 March 2025) | 646 |
This year’s top 10 list continues to show how many older Bibliolore posts continue to live on well after their initial posting date. Classic posts, such as Mahler and Beyoncé from 2011, which is this year’s top post and remains the overall top post, still garner hundreds of hits monthly. Newer favorites, such as the posts on Public Enemy, Okinawan music, Sly Stone, Central American music and dance, and Jayashri Ramnath represent new directions for Bibliolore in highlighting RILM’s diverse global content.
Bibliolore has published more than 1,820 posts and has been viewed more than 1,008,230 times since its inception in October 2009. Views since July 2024 averaged 240 per day. The site currently has over 2600 subscribers, and its Facebook page has 131 followers.
RILM’s WeChat account continues to grow as a vital platform for engaging Chinese-speaking audiences with musicological research and resources. The account shares news about RILM, highlights scholarly trends through its databases, and features translated articles (with permission), helping to connect global music research with Chinese readers.
In FY 2025, the account published 13 posts, including the most-viewed and second most-viewed posts in the account’s history. These contributions brought total views to over 67,000, with unique views counted per IP address. By the end of the FY, the account had surpassed 10,100 followers, a significant increase from 7,500 the previous year—reflecting the platform’s expanding reach and influence.
Figures on individual posts published in FY 2025 (in the order of popularity):
RILM’s WeChat account has published altogether 56 posts and has been viewed more than 160,000 times since its inception in November 2020, with an average of 2,850 views per article.