Month: May 2024

Database highlight – Naxos Music Library (NML)

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Cambridge University members have access to Naxos Music Library (NML), the world’s largest online classical music library.

NML offers streaming access to nearly 3 million tracks of both standard and rare repertoire. Over 600 new titles are added to the library each month.

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The contents can be browsed by composer, artist, genre, category and label. In addition to listening to recordings, NML provides liner notes for many albums. Listeners can create personalized playlists or enjoy predefined NML playlists, such as this one for relaxation and contemplation.

Additional NML resources include –

  • Over 900 aural training exercises
  • Guided tours on classical music eras
  • Audio book transcriptions about the history of classical music and opera
  • Libretti and synopses of over 700 operas
  • A guide on composer and artist names as well as musical terms
  • In-depth analyses of selected works
  • Podcasts
  • Interactive music dictionary with music examples and notation

Also available via the Cambridge Databases A-Z

Please remember to log out from Naxos Music Library once you have finished your session.

Muteferriqa: trial access until 12th July 2024

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Cambridge University members now have trial access to Muteferriqa. The trial will be active until 12th July 2024.

Please tell us what you think about this resource using our feedback form.

Muteferriqa is a primary source research portal containing 7 million pages of Ottoman Turkish printed books and periodicals, on which you can search and read in Ottoman, Turkish, and English; and make visual discoveries as well through image search. It contains an exceptionally rich collection of printed materials published in the Ottoman Empire from the 18th to mid-20th century.

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Through its Web interface, Muteferriqa lets you perform full-text search within seconds across millions of pages of its corpus, which consists of virtually all the books and a large majority of periodicals ever printed in Ottoman Turkish. Refining queries through rich and extensive metadata gives relevant cross-sections of the material.

Muteferriqa also features advanced search modalities, namely, wildcard, fuzzy and proximity search, that will take you to your specific target and beyond. Visual search retrieves unique visuals contained in the corpus by matching your textual queries with captions or descriptions of the visual content.

Muteferriqa, by extracting semantic relations and similarities within its corpus, takes you beyond your own queries with its recommendations, sometimes to surprisingly serendipitous discoveries.

Text from the Muteferriqa website.

Database highlights – Box of Broadcasts

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Box of Broadcasts is a database of British TV and radio broadcasts made available for educational use. This resource is available to members of the University of Cambridge both on and off campus within the UK. Off campus access is not available from outside the UK and on campus access is restricted to members of the university as a Raven login is required.

What the team at Box of Broadcasts says in their ‘About us’ section:

We believe that moving image and sound play a crucial role in education and research. By incorporating these dynamic elements alongside the written word, our members can enhance comprehension, cater to diverse learning styles, and engage attention. Through audiovisual means, we can effectively convey emotions, demonstrate practical skills, and provide valuable context to the subject matter.

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If there is a specific programme you need to use there is a simple search option that will search for keywords in programme titles and transcripts. Using “quotes” will help to find a specific phrase in a programme title or in the programme transcript. If you find your search term in a transcript and click on the transcript section of the results list you will be able to start watching the video at the specific spot where the phrase appears in the programme.

The advanced search option will allow you to restrict your search by date, channel, availability, and let’s you toggle between searches for title, transcripts or both.

BoB captures over 75 channels from a mix of Freeview and Freesat television, with ten channels available in foreign languages. Here is the current channel list. All channels are potentially subject to change.

To record a programme you must be signed in. Either select a programme from the guide and click ‘request programme’, or, use the search bar to look for programmes using keywords. Filter the results with the custom date range and again, click ‘request programme’ to record. Once recorded, you’ll find the programme in My BoB.

You can make 20 recordings a day and unlimited clips.

The programme record will include citation and broadcast information.

The ‘Share’ options will give a URL, a WAFLess URL (that will prompt for Raven), and an option of a link that can be embedded.

You can also take a clip from a programme if the full programme is not needed.

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Box of Broadcasts offers a number of ‘How to’ video tutorials to help you make the most of the resource.

Recommended browsers for using BoB are:

  • Internet Explorer 11 – Windows 8 (and above)
  • Edge 12 (or later)
  • Mozilla Firefox 44 (or later)
  • Safari 8 (or later)
  • Google Chrome 49 (or later)


Database highlights – Project Gutenberg

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Project Gutenberg is a database of over 70,000 freely available ebooks and audio books.

The books can be searched by title and there are options to see lists of books available in a number of languages.

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Project Gutenberg, a nonprofit organization (since 2000) that maintains an electronic library of public domain works that have been digitized, or converted into e-books, by volunteers and archived for download from the organization’s website, http://www.gutenberg.org. The project got its start on July 4, 1971, when Michael Hart, a student at the University of Illinois, began typing the U.S. Declaration of Independence into the school’s computer system for distribution free of charge. He soon followed with the works of William Shakespeare and the Bible. Thus began Project Gutenberg, the oldest digital library.
Hosch, William L.. “Project Gutenberg”. Encyclopedia Britannica, 21 Sep. 2023. Accessed 25 April 2024.

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There will be a number of options for viewing your chosen texts, including:
Read online (web)
EPUB3 (E-readers incl. Send-to-Kindle)
EPUB (older E-readers)
EPUB (no images, older E-readers)
Kindle
older Kindles
Plain Text UTF-8
Download HTML (zip)

If you have any questions about the copyright or the books please see the Project Gutenberg ‘Help, How-To, Procedures, Guidance and Information‘ pages.

Please note – Project Gutenberg eBooks may be freely used in the United States because most are not protected by U.S. copyright law. They may not be free of copyright in other countries. Readers outside of the United States must check the copyright terms of their countries before accessing, downloading or redistributing eBooks. We also have a number of copyrighted titles, for which the copyright holder has given permission for unlimited non-commercial worldwide use

Digital Theatre + : An Inspector Calls

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If you have enjoyed visiting the ‘Murder by the Book’ exhibition at the University Library you might enjoy watching ‘An Inspector Calls’ (J. B. Priestley, 1947) on Digital Theatre +.

Digital Theatre + is available for members of the University of Cambridge to access via the link in the Databases A-Z.

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Along with making a video of a production available DT+ also offer a selection of teaching and learning resources, including:

Unlocked Study Guide: An Inspector Calls
Lesson Toolkits: An Inspector Calls
Unlocked: An Inspector Calls video series

‘An Inspector Calls: a Play in Three Acts’ was first published in the UK in 1947. A copy of the 1947 edition is available to be ordered to the Rare Books Reading Room using classmark 1947.7.416.

From the Digital Theatre + platform:

“Our education team oversees all of the content that is created at Digital Theatre+, from exclusive video resources and interviews to detailed study guides, essays and lesson plans. With backgrounds in education, publishing and theatre, their knowledge and expertise are the guiding force behind everything that Digital Theatre+ produces. We also work with 150 educators from around the world, drawing on their unique perspectives to advise and aid us in content creation and acquisition, site development, partnerships, projects, ethics and aesthetics, ensuring that schools and universities receive the best quality resources.”

If you are not a member of the University of Cambridge you will be able to access Digital Theatre + from one of the PCs within the University Library. Digital Theatre + also offers some freely available resources for everyone to use.

Database highlight – Digital Theatre +

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Digital Theatre + is available for members of the University of Cambridge to access via the link in the Databases A-Z.

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From the Digital Theatre + platform:

“Our education team oversees all of the content that is created at Digital Theatre+, from exclusive video resources and interviews to detailed study guides, essays and lesson plans. With backgrounds in education, publishing and theatre, their knowledge and expertise are the guiding force behind everything that Digital Theatre+ produces. We also work with 150 educators from around the world, drawing on their unique perspectives to advise and aid us in content creation and acquisition, site development, partnerships, projects, ethics and aesthetics, ensuring that schools and universities receive the best quality resources.”

“We’ve curated an extraordinary collection of interviews, lectures, essays, and workshops featuring world-leading theatre makers. 

“With exclusive insights from key practitioners such as Anne Bogart, Luis Valdez, Augusto Boal, and Katie Mitchell, and authoritative materials from hundreds of world-class scholars, you’ll have everything you need…” 

Alongside access to full length productions from the RSC, National Youth Theatre and many others you will find video resources (including documentaries, interviews and workshops), written resources (including essays and play texts), and teaching resources.

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If you are not a member of the University of Cambridge you will be able to access Digital Theatre + from one of the PCs within the University Library. Digital Theatre + also offers some freely available resources for everyone to use.