Archive of World Music

The Archive of World Music at Loeb Music Library collects archival field recordings of musics worldwide, as well as commercial audiovisual recordings and streaming resources of ethnomusicological interest.

The collection was established in 1976 by Professor John Ward. In 1992, with the appointment of Harvard's first senior professor of ethnomusicology, the collection moved to the Loeb Music Library.

The Archive has developed important collections from Asia and the Middle East. It holds diverse archival material, such as wide-ranging Chinese songs acquired by Harvard Professor Emeritus Rulan Pian; extensive field recordings made by Martha Forsyth in 1980s of traditional Bulgarian songs; field recordings of Tvisöngur (male polyphony in Iceland); and !Kung field recordings. Numerous recordings of Indonesian music have also been acquired, primarily on commercial sound cassettes.

Some of the Archive's major collections include:

• the James Rubin Collection of Indian Classical Music, one of the largest collections of Indian classical music in the U.S.
• the Kay Kaufman Shelemay Collection of Ethiopian Music
• the Sema Vakf Collection of Turkish Classical Music, one of the largest outside of Turkey
• the Laura Boulton Collection of Byzantine and Eastern Orthodox Musics
• the Eduard Alekseyev Fieldwork Collection of the Musical Cultural of Yakutia
• the Stephen Blum Collection of Music from Iranian Khorāsān
• the Rubén Blades Archive
• the Arabic 78 Collection

While collection development focuses on the Middle East, Asia and Africa, the Archive is expanding its holdings of recordings from Mexico, Central and South America, as well as from all around the globe.

Substantial grant funding from the Laura Boulton Foundation, the Sema Vakf Foundation, and the Harvard University Library Digital Initiative has supported efforts to preserve and digitize collections.