Notes

Notes 58.2 (2001) 302-305

Trends in the Price of Music Monographs and Scores As Reflected in Notes, 1995-2000

Compiled by Brad Short

This article uses as a starting point the work that Calvin Elliker presented here for the past six years. The exact methods used to calculate these figures are currently being reviewed with the goal of providing useful and authoritative data to interested parties.

This year the numbers are based on data drawn from the "Book Reviews," "Books Recently Published," and "Music Received" featured in Notes. No restrictions are made to include only publications with a particular copyright or publication date. Rather, materials that appeared in the above columns throughout the 2000 calendar year are represented.

As in the previous installments, the data are organized into eleven categories developed to accommodate the various bibliographic forms represented in the data set. These categories, unfortunately, do not replicate those used by the editors of these columns. Occasionally it is difficult to determine from the information appearing in descriptive notes to which category an item might best belong. This situation, therefore, requires some interpretation on behalf of this compiler.

It is assumed that previous years' calculations for Monographs and Monographic Series were done using a statistical sample take from all the titles listed in the "Book Reviews" and "Book Recently Published" columns. This year, prices were found for 856 English, German, Italian, and French books and were used to calculate the numbers below. This is a major change in the way the numbers have been derived.

While the total number of scores used to calculate these numbers in most categories is down from previous years, the drop is not dramatic when comparing the change in mean price. For several categories, however, notably Monumental Editions, Keyboard Solos, Vocal Solos, and Vocal Ensembles, the drop is significant in both the number of scores included in the category and the percent change from the previous year.

The categories used are monographs, monographic series, monumental editions, keyboard solos, instrumental solos, instrumental ensembles, [End Page 302] vocal solos, vocal ensembles, full scores, vocal scores, and miniature scores. Each category is defined below. Sets of parts for bands, orchestras, and choirs are excluded from the data set. The definitions for this year's column use the previous year's definitions with some remarks and clarifications added.

Monographs: Books that are not issued as installments in a publisher's continuation under a distinctive series title. (This year's figures use only books in English, German, Italian, and French.)

Monographic Series: Books that are issued as installments in a publisher's continuation under a distinctive series title. (For this year, all numbered series were considered continuations. As with monographs, only books in English, German, Italian, and French were used.)

Monumental Editions: Critical editions of scores usually representing specific ethnic, national, geographical, or chronological repertories, or the compositions of a particular individual. Such scores are often placed in special sections of
library classification schemes, as in classes M2, M3, and M3.1 of the Library of Congress Classification. (A score with accompanying critical report is counted as one.)

Keyboard Solos: Scores for unaccompanied organ, piano, harpsichord, clavichord, electronic keyboard, and similar instruments.

Instrumental solos: Scores for a principle instrument, unaccompanied or accompanied. In the case of unaccompanied works, a single instrument that is not a keyboard; for example, a work for one unaccompanied violin. In the case of accompanied works, a single principle instrument featured with a keyboard instrument usually constrained to a subordinate role throughout the composition;
for example, a sonata for violin with piano accompaniment, a concerto for violin with the orchestral accompaniment condensed and arranged for piano, or--
similarly--a piano concerto with the orchestral accompaniment condensed and arranged for second piano.

Instrumental Ensembles: Scores for any combination of two or more instruments where no single instrument is featured prominently throughout the composition. Examples include a sonata for two pianos, a string quartet, a piano trio, or a sinfonia concertante for violin and viola with the orchestral accompaniment condensed and arranged...