RILM MUSIC ABSTRACTS of MUSIC LITERATURE

RILM indexes over 500 scholarly journals in music, book chapters, dissertations, and media, providing abstracts for most of the records. You may be linked to the full-text of an article if it is available. Otherwise you will need to find the actual journal, either at North Park or through interlibrary loan.

1. Go to North Park University Library’s homepage: http://www.northpark.edu/library

2. Click on “Databases/Articles.”

3. Choose “Databases A-Z.”

4. Click on “RILM Music Abstracts.” At the next menu, click on RILM again.

5. Type one or more key search terms in the Find box.

6. Click the Search button, and review the list of results. You will be told if the library owns the journal being cited or if you can link to the full text article. However, if the item is a book you will need to look it up in the online catalog to see if we own it. The database will say we do not have it.

7. Click on the title of the article to read an abstract or summary. Click on Linked Full Text to read the complete article, if it is available.

8. For more search field options (such as author), try the advanced search.

· Under Document Type you can limit your search to just article in a periodical (as opposed to books or dissertations, etc.) There are many choices here.

· Under Language of Item you can limit your search to English.

9. For help with subject terms, click the “Subjects” tab on the top menu.

10. Use the Indexes tab to check spellings and author names.

11. If your search did not produce enough results, enter new search terms and try again. Look at the terms in the Descriptors field to find more terms to search.

12. Click on Print or E-mail.

SEARCH TIPS

· Keep it simple. Begin your search by entering one or two important terms. You can always add more terms to narrow your search.

· Increase the relevance of your results by searching in the subject index field (advanced search) rather than the keyword index (basic search).

· Limit the document type to article in a periodical

· Use the Advanced Search to combine terms in different fields. Make sure you are looking for your search term in the proper field.

Example: Search for Mozart and arias in Subject

· If your topic is very broad (e.g., Beethoven) you can limit your search to North Park holdings.

· Check Serials Solutions to see if the journal is available full text in another database.

· If North Park does not own a book or journal that you want, you can request it through Interlibrary Loan (forms at reference desk or online under General Information at library website (http://www.northpark.edu/library).