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Describing Music Materials: A Manual for Resource Description of Printed and Recorded Music and Music Videos by Richard P. Smiraglia (review)

The fifteen-month period preceding the writing of this review has been a watershed for music catalogers seeking vocational guidance in long form. During that period, there appeared not one but two monographic publications about bibliographic description and access for music: the book by Richard P. Smiraglia that is the subject of this review, and one by Jean Harden, music cataloging librarian at the University of North Texas ( Jean Harden, Music Descrip tion and Access: Solving the Puzzle of Cataloging, Music Library Association Technical Reports, no. 34 [Middleton, WI: A-R Editions; Music Library Associa tion, 2018]). Lamentably, a full, comparative analysis of the two works is beyond the scope of this review, but suffice it to say, both texts are a welcome sight to practitioners in a field that has experienced constant change in recent years. Jihee Beak joined Smiraglia for this fourth edition of a text whose genesis goes back thirty-four years; its earliest progenitor appeared under the title Cataloging Music: A Manual for Use with AACR2 (Lake Crystal, MN: Soldier Creek Press, 1983). To say that the conveyed to be more than needed, but the book was not necessarily meant to be read straight through and can be just as useful digested in small chunks. In the way it uses discussions of individual songs to tell the wider story of Jamaican popular music, the book bears a resemblance to the revised and expanded third edition of the classic Rough Guide to Reggae (London: Rough Guides, 2004) compiled by UK reggae scholar Steve Barrow with Peter Dalton. Garnice’s book is well timed, as the most recent edition of The Rough Guide to Reggae is now nearly fifteen years old. Bob Marley fans in particular will be interested in the seven chapters devoted to in-depth analysis of his recordings. While the name and song indexes are quite detailed, minor quibbles with the book include the lack of a subject index and the perfunctory bibliography. Considering the thoroughness of each entry, it is difficult to believe that all of the information came from the eight sources listed in the bibliography, which leaves this reviewer to wonder if the author consulted other sources, such as Web sites, magazine articles, or even CD or LP liner notes. Though perhaps too detailed for small public libraries or community colleges, medium to large public and academic libraries may find this book to be a very popular title, especially in areas with an active reggae scene or substantial Jamaican populations. It can also be used very effectively as a buying guide to the music. The book has a handsome, good-quality binding and looks as though it will stand up to repeated use. Since the late 1990s, there has been a plethora of books published on reggae and its related offshoots (or, in some cases, antecedents). The state of reggae literature is as strong today as in recent memory, and Garnice’s book is a valuable addition to that canon.