The Archives of African American Music and Culture (AAAMC) was established in 1991 and contains “a range of African American musical idioms and cultural expressions from the post–World War II era.”Footnote 1 Located on Indiana University's campus in Bloomington, Indiana, the AAAMC is open to the public, but circulation of archival collections is limited and restricted to Indiana University (IU) faculty and graduate teaching assistants. External researchers and visitors are encouraged to make an appointment to use physical materials onsite.
The AAAMC collections highlight African Americans and their contributions to popular music, classical music, and the music industry. The archives also house extensive materials related to the documentation of Black radio. Formats represented include oral histories, interviews, photographs, music manuscripts, audio and video recordings, educational broadcast programs, and the personal papers of individuals and organizations associated with Black music. The “Explore Collections” webpage offers a snapshot of genres represented in the archives and a link to the “Special Collections List” for browsing by genre: special collections, general collections, Black radio, classical, hip hop, music industry, popular music, and religious music. A list of archival collections, in alphabetical order, is found under each genre heading.
Each webpage devoted to a collection provides a collection number (which also appears alongside the collection heading, in “list” view under genre), the collection creator, a short abstract, the size of the collection in linear feet, and a link to the online finding aid. Some collections are minimally described with only a collection number and abstract. Several collection pages include external links to digitized images from the IU Libraries Image Collection Online platform, as well as streaming media from the IU Media Collections Online platform. The online finding aids include extensive scope and content notes, a list of names associated with the collection, topics for searching in IU's library catalog, and a comprehensive collection inventory list showing series-box-folder level information. External links for finding aids and digitized images are reliable, but those for streaming media are not consistently available. The most reliable method for accessing streaming media content (both digitized and born-digital) is through the IU Media Collections Online platform.Footnote 2
The “Online Access” page (linked on the “Collections” webpage) provides external links to various IU Libraries online platforms for digital media.Footnote 3 For scholars, educators, and researchers interested in exploring findings aids for the AAAMC collections, a curated collection link is available for browsing by alphabetical order.Footnote 4 Similarly, a curated collection link is available for digital images from the AAAMC and related library collections on the IU Image Collections Online platform.Footnote 5 Some digital images and media are available for public access and use, while others may be restricted to the IU campus community only. For researchers, scholars, and digital humanists interested in multimedia collections, the “Digital Exhibits” page (from the “Collections” webpage) provides access to a four-part series titled The Golden Age of Black Radio. The digital exhibit series features images and audio excerpts (including transcripts) from various Black radio collections. Overall, the “Collections” webpage and its subpages provide extensive information for researchers, scholars, and educators looking to explore the AAAMC collections prior to making an in-person visit.
The AAAMC's outreach activities include publications that inform the public, the music industry, and internal and external scholarly communities of activities and collections within the Archives. Liner Notes, the archive's annual newsletter (and a free PDF publication), contains recent activities and programs at the AAAMC, collection features and highlights, announcements of digital initiatives, interviews with musicians and music industry personnel, book reviews, and finding aid updates for new and existing AAAMC collections.Footnote 6 The newsletter has been in publication since 1997. Black Grooves, a music reviews site hosted by the AAAMC, features monthly reviews of new albums (and some books and films) celebrating Black music and culture.Footnote 7 The website is structured similarly to a blog, with genre categories for browsing and a dropdown navigation list of reviews by month. Those interested in media reviews can subscribe via email to be notified when new reviews are published. Other listings under “Publications” include monographs on the topic of African American and Black music, edited or co-edited by former AAAMC directors and published by various academic publishers and university presses.
The AAAMC Speaks documentary series is a recent outreach program that strongly aligns with the archive's mission to expose collection materials to the general public.Footnote 8 The four-part video series brings to life unique collections and holdings in the AAAMC, and features media and interview segments of Black music industry leaders, scholars, and AAAMC staff. The series is publicly available through Indiana University's YouTube account.
The AAAMC and its website provides a robust research experience for researchers, scholars, music educators, librarians, and archivists, as well as the general public interested in exploring how Black music and culture—and its visionary creators, industry leaders, and scholars—have shaped US music and culture in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The archives provide generous online access to digitized and born-digital images, audio, and video content for scholars, researchers, and educators looking to incorporate collection materials into instructional content, presentations, and digital exhibits and projects. In alignment with its mission, the AAAMC continues its legacy as a strong advocate, champion, and sponsor of Black music and culture, and of its impact on present-day US musical traditions.
