I sat in front of this baby for a while the other day. And you know what? It was kind of amazing!
Believe it or not, I had to reference something on microfilm for work! Let me fill you in: a month or so ago we heard a rumor that a certain piece of music might be floating about somewhere in the world, and we were eager to check it out. So a couple weeks ago I got a call that the music was in England- but was a
microfilm. So using my trusty friend "Inter-library Loan" we requested the film and it finally arrived a few days ago. So I pranced up to the library and thanked my lucky stars that my mom had taught me how to use one of these machines when I was a kid!
But you know what made this whole experience really cool? This music (written by
Poulenc) has been altered by
Benjamin Britten! Back in 1958 Britten was going to perform this opera, and he worked with another pianist to take the orchestral reduction and flesh it out into two piano parts. And this microfilm is a copy of his entire score:
Isn't that amazing? Hundreds of pages of irreplaceable music, written in Britten's own hand...
Shrunken down to these tiny strips of film and shipped across the Atlantic just for us!
I know I say it a lot- but my job sure is cool!
Thank you for visiting- I hope you have a wonderful day!
