The Irish Traditional Music Archive (ITMA) is committed to providing free, universal access to the rich cultural tradition of Irish music, song and dance. If you’re able, we’d love for you to consider a donation. Any level of support will help us preserve and grow this tradition for future generations.
This week’s placement gave the students an opportunity to explore the different departments of ITMA and learn about the important role each plays in preserving and promoting Irish traditional music, song and dance.
In the Library, they discovered how books and CDs are catalogued and organised, and how to search for materials using the library catalogue. They put these skills into practice by selecting materials for a Halloween and Irish folklore-themed display which you can now visit in the library! They also helped to organise and sort ephemera relating to County Clare, grouping the materials into folders for easier access.
In the studio, they learned about the preservation and digitisation of reel-to-reel tapes, which allowed them to gain insight into the work involved in safeguarding these recordings for future generations.
Below is a reflection on the experience from each of the three students:
I did a week of work experience in ITMA and I really enjoyed working here as I got to find tunes and songs to learn that I wouldn’t have been able to access. I also really enjoyed working in the recording studio and learning how to convert cassettes into mp3.
Hi, my names Laoise and I’m just finishing my week of work experience at ITMA. I’ve really enjoyed the last week and have learned new skills, such as transcribing music from cassettes and reel-to-reels, how a library is organised and how to locate items in an archive. I’ve liked all of this, and found it all very interesting, however, my highlight of the week would have to be arranging a display for Halloween in the library. I now have a better understanding of how archives and libraries work and am very grateful for it.
I did a week of work experience in the ITMA. It was really interesting and enjoyable.
The work was interesting. We were allowed to play CDs from the collection and read old tune books. The highlight for me was the recording studio where we got walked through how old cassettes and reel to reels are digitised. It was a brilliant experience that I’d highly recommend.
Uploaded by Heather Wallace.
