Overview
Date/time interval
Primo Semestre (29/09/2025 - 23/01/2026)
Syllabus
Course Objectives
At the end of the course, students will have acquired basic knowledge of the procedures and standards for the preservation, acquisition and digital processing of audio and video, with particular regard to their use for documentation and research activities. To this end, the materials (Volonté and Pongolini collections) and equipment available in the Department's Media Library and Digital Lab will be used to illustrate their consistency and functioning as well as to demonstrate their possible applications. The expected learning outcomes are as follows: - be able to plan and carry out the digitisation and cataloguing of sound materials; - acquire skills in the recording (audio and possibly video) of interviews, small groups of instrumentalists and performers, and events, using the appropriate hardware and software equipment; - conceive and be able to place original research projects that include the acquisition, reworking and cataloguing of pre-existing sound materials or the recording of performances within the current state of the art.
Course Prerequisites
The workshop does not require any specific prerequisites. It can offer a complementary educational opportunity, in terms of technical and practical knowledge, to students of courses related to 20th and 21st century music, as well as to those interested in learning the fundamentals of sound and audiovisual recording, as well as techniques for the conservation, cataloguing and restoration of analogue sound sources (tapes and discs). Preliminary knowledge of the main media for sound preservation and playback, the main digital audio formats and experience in using at least one platform for audio editing and production is desirable. Furthermore, as this is a workshop in which various tasks will be carried out collaboratively, the prerequisites are complemented by an aptitude for teamwork, problem solving, sharing critical issues and knowledge, and peer review procedures. At the beginning of the course, a self-assessment test will be distributed to verify the respective levels of technical and theoretical knowledge, which will be useful for designing a common path suitable for the composition of the group of participants.
Teaching Methods
The course will alternate between lectures (24 hours in total, some of which may be held in blended mode) and practical exercises (24 hours in total, in person). This structure will allow students to work on the practical application of the concepts presented during the lectures, while also providing an opportunity to assess their learning outcomes as they progress. Each lecture may also include a review of the assignments given to students, which will be considered an integral part of the training programme and will contribute to the overall assessment.
Assessment Methods
Learning is assessed on the basis of various criteria, which relate both to the work carried out during the course and to individual preparation. The quality of the assignments requested during the course will be taken into consideration, as well as participation and the ability to contribute significantly to the workshops. The oral exam will involve the discussion of a specific bibliography for attending students and a written paper (approx. 20,000 characters) in which the student must illustrate the main characteristics of an original digitisation and/or research project related to the production of audio or video materials. As this is a workshop-based course and partly based on the use of Department equipment, the possibility of non-attending students is particularly problematic and must be agreed on a case-by-case basis with the teacher as far in advance as possible.
Texts
- F. BRESSAN, Analytical Description of a Data Sheet for Audio Preservation: From Meaning to Data and Back, «Fontes Artis Musicae», 65/4, 2018, pp. 230-257. - F. BRESSAN, S. CANAZZA, Preserving Music Cultural Heritage, in A. King, E Himonides, S. A. Ruthmann, S.A. (dds.), The Routledge Companion to Music, Technology, and Education, New York, Routledge, 2017, https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315686431 - J. FLANDERS-F. JANNIDIS, Data Modeling, in Susan Schreibman-Ray Siemens-John Unsworth, A New Companion to Digital Humanities, Malden, Wiley-Blackwell, 2016, pp. 229-238. - B. HEILE, Who Wrote Duke Ellington’s Music? Authorship and Collective Creativity in ‘Mood Indigo’, in Concepts of Music and Copyright: How Music Perceives Itself and How Copyright Perceives Music, edited by Andreas Rahmatian, Cheltenham, Edward Elgar Publishing, 2015, pp. 123-142. - F. LEMMERS, Digitizing Sound Archives at Royal Library of Belgium: Challenges and difficulties encountered during a major digitization project, «Bibliothek Forschung und Praxis», 42/2, 2018, pp. 263-271. https://doi.org/10.1515/bfp-2018-0035. - N. PRETTO, C. FANTOZZI, E. MICHELONI, V. BURINI, S. CANAZZA, Computing Methodologies Supporting the Preservation of Electroacoustic Music from Analog Magnetic Tape, «Computer Music Journal», 42/4, 2018, pp. 59–74, doi: https://doi.org/10.1162/comj_a_00487 - P. RIVA, P. LE BŒUF, M. ŽUMER, IFLA Library Reference Model: A Conceptual Model for Bibliographic Information, Den Haag, International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, 2017, https://www.ifla.org/files/assets/cataloguing/frbr-lrm/ifla-lrm-august-2017.pdf, pp. 83-96.
Contents
The course is structured around four main, closely interrelated thematic areas: 1) presentation of the Department's equipment and its phonographic collections, with reference to the possible impact of these collections on research and the dissemination of musical studies; 2) digital formats for sound and image recording, demonstration of the functioning of audio and video software for the recording and production of audio and audiovisual content; 3) the digitisation of analogue and digital sound media, including their cataloguing according to the metadata scheme prepared within the Pavia Digital Library database; 4) initial audio restoration operations, from theory to practice.
Course Language
Italian
Degrees
Degrees
MUSICOLOGY
Master’s Degree
2 years
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