Å®ÉúСÊÓƵ

Musical scores penned by the late composer Leonard Bernstein, as well
as audio and video recordings of Bernstein at work, will be available instantly
to anyone with a computer and modem in a unique computerised multimedia
database being prepared by the US Library of Congress in Washington DC.

The electronic archive will include Bernstein’s original music manuscripts,
unpublished works and correspondence, more than 1000 audio recordings and
more than 200 hours of video recordings, all of which were donated by Bernstein’s
family.

Staff at the library say digitising all the material – which occupies
400 metres of shelf space – will be an enormous task. The library will also
have to develop computer systems that will allow users to search and retrieve
material.

‘We are committed to creating a ‘library without walls’ that would
allow free and unrestricted access to these and other rich collections in
the library’s custody,’ says James Billington, the library’s head.