Collections : [Rare Book & Manuscript Library]

Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Rare Book & Manuscript Library

6th Floor East Butler Library
535 West 114th Street
New York, NY 10027, USA
rbml@library.columbia.edu
The Rare Book & Manuscript Library is Columbia University’s principal repository for special collections. We collect, preserve, describe, promote, and provide access to the material evidence of diverse individuals and activities in alignment with the University’s research and teaching mission. We build and steward deep collections in select subject areas and connect them to a global audience through reference, teaching, exhibitions, publications, and public programs.
Start Over "Composers" Repository Rare Book & Manuscript Library
Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Joseph Elliott Slater papers, 1929-1996, bulk 1940-1996

29.5 linear feet
Joseph Elliot Slater was an American economist, internationalist and intellectual entrepreneur born in 1922. He died in 2002 of Parkinson's disease. Over the course of his lifetime, Slater was involved in a number of corporations, institutes, and government committees. From 1944-1954 he held a number of crucial post-war positions related to the denazification of Germany and the Allied High Commission. Throughout the twentieth century he worked as an economist and director of international affairs at a number of corporations including Creole Petroleum, the Ford Foundation and Volvo North America. While at the Ford Foundation Slater went on two details to work for the Executive Branch; first, as the Secretary for President Eisenhower's Commision on Foreign Assistance (the Draper Committee), and second, as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Education and Cultural Affairs during the Kennedy administration. Slater served as the President and the CEO of the Salk Institute from 1967-1972 and held the same positions at the Aspen Institute for Humanistic Studies from 1969-1986. After leaving the Aspen Institute, Slater served as the Chairman of the John J. McCloy International Center. In the final decade of his life Slater served as a trustee and member of the board of directors for a number of organizations related to education, science, the arts, and foreign relations. The material in this collection includes files and items from all of these eras of Slater's professional life. While much of this collection is related to Slater's various professional roles, there are personal files interspersed throughout the collection.
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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

F. C. Schang visiting cards collection, 1800-1982

6 linear feet

Collection of visiting cards of musical artists (composers, vocalists, conductors, etc.) and authors, presidents, and other celebrities of the 19th and 20th centuries, most bearing handwritten messages. There are also photographs and other memorabilia.

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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Columbia University Press records, 1893-2000s, bulk 1923-2000s

752 linear feet

This collection contains the correspondence, editorial files and office files of the Columbia University Press, primarily from its reorganization in 1923 by Frederick Coykendall to the present.

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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

RBML Office Files, 1917-2022

176.26 linear feet
This collection contains the administrative records of the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, from its days as the Department of Special Collections to the present.
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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Alvin Singleton papers, 1952-2021

9.22 Linear Feet
Composer Alvin Singleton was born on December 28, 1940 in Brooklyn, New York. He has composed music for theatre, orchestra, solo instruments, and a variety of chamber ensembles. The collection includes primarily musical scores, as well as audio recordings, clippings and other biographical materials, correspondence, photographs, programs, scrapbooks.
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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Herbert H. Lehman Papers, 1878-2002, bulk 1930-1963

607 linear feet
This collection documents the personal and political life of Herbert H. Lehman, who served as lieutenant governor, governor, and senator of New York, and as director-general of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.
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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Book Arts Ephemera collection, 1890-2019

158.5 Linear Feet

These files have been compiled by the Rare Book and Manuscript Library from its origin in 1930 through the present day. The material derives largely from gifts, and the occasional purchase; much of the subject file in particular is made of ephemera included in the American Type Founders, Co. Library, purchased in 1942. Prospectuses and information sent by fine presses and book artists are added to the relevant files in an ongoing fashion. The files cover subjects from the beginning of printing to the current day.

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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Typographic Library records, 1576- 1950

84 boxes

A collection of letters, manuscripts, and documents relating to the history of printing and the graphic arts. The collection is in six parts. Cataloged Correspondence and manuscripts, including cataloged letters to and from Henry Lewis Bullen, the librarian of American Typefounders Company Library. Uncataloged letters of the Typographic Library, including routine correspondence, letters of inquiry to Bullen, the Library's order file, and library correspondence of Columbia University, 1941-1946, pertaining to the collection. Correspondence, manuscripts, documents and printed material by and relating to Henry L. Bullen. Letter books, ledgers, daybooks, and journals of the early American typefounders, Binney and Ronaldson. A collection of over 200 typographical patents for the design of printing types (19th and 20th centuries). Archives of the Companía Real de Impresores, Madrid, relating to its operations and business.

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Rare Book & Manuscript Library

H. Lawrence Freeman papers, 1870-1982, 2015, bulk 1890-1954

35 linear feet
The original scores, clippings, correspondence and ephemera in this collection document the lives and careers of Harry Lawrence, Carlotta, and Valdo Freeman, a family of African-American performing artists involved in opera, theatre, and music in early-twentieth-century New York.
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Celia Elizabeth Davidson "Operas by Afro-American Composers: A Critical Survey and Analysis of Selected Works", 1980 Box 45, Folder 13

Celia Elizabeth Davidson "Operas by Afro-American Composers: A Critical Survey and Analysis of

(A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the School of Music of the Catholic University of America in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements or the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy)

  1. Series X: Additions to the Collection
  2. 2023:

Subseries I.2: Other Scores, 1894-1942, undated

chronologically by publication date. Also included are printed scores by other composers. Selections range from
composers such as T.H. Burleigh, W.C. Handy and Noble Sissle. They are arranged alphabetically by the

This subseries includes photocopies of three of Freeman's manuscript scores: "The Slaying of the Lion,"Voodoo(Act III only), and "Zulu King (Witch Hunt)." It also houses all published scores by Freeman present in the collection. Most of the published scores are originals, but some are in photocopy form. All scores in this subseries are songs, not operas or symphonic works, and many are arrangements of well-known spirituals. Two of the earliest published songs (1896-1897, with only photocopies extant) were also published by a "Harry Freeman" in Chicago – they may have been self-published, or the name may be a coincidence. Two songs from 1925 were published by Valdo Freeman. The songs are arranged chronologically by publication date. Also included are printed scores by other composers. Selections range from Brahms to arrangements of spirituals; the bulk are early-twentieth-century songs by African-American composers such as T.H. Burleigh, W.C. Handy and Noble Sissle. They are arranged alphabetically by the composer's last name.

  1. Series I: Musical Scores, 1893-1950
Rare Book & Manuscript Library

Robert Wilson papers, 1969-2000

148 linear feet

Correspondence, outlines, scripts, production notes, technical materials, story boards, contracts, posters, programs, announcements, recordings, reviews, and other printed materials relating to all aspects of Robert Wilson's theater works, opera, films, artwork and video productions. There are files for all of Wilson's theatrical performances, the most extensive of which is the CIVIL warS. Also included are the files of the Byrd Hoffman Foundation.

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