Research Steps

How to Search Through a Database:

SELECT A DATABASE

Select one from the "Home - Get Help" Tab

BEGIN SEARCH WITH 4-5 KEYWORDS related to your topic.

Start off your search by using 1-2 of your keywords.
Use more keywords when you need to narrow or broaden search.

USE FILTERS

There are filters on the search bar that allow you to search by title, author, or text.
Filters on the left-hand side can adjust: Date of publication, peer-reviewed, language, etc.

NARROW or BROADEN SEARCH with these tricks:

AND will narrow your results.
OR will broaden your results (think: or means more!).
NOT will narrow your results by avoiding unwanted terms.
“ “ (QUOTATION MARKS) will search for the EXACT phrase in quotation marks.
* (ASTERICK) will broaden your search by finding all potential forms of that word. (Ex: prevent* will give you prevention, prevents, preventative, etc.)

CITE SOURCES using Chicago

Music Databases

Popular Music Databases:

Find the complete list of music databases here.

Databases for Scholarly Texts (Academic Journal Articles)

JSTOR This link opens in a new window
A digital interdisciplinary archive of over 1,000 leading academic journals in the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. JSTOR also includes other valuable materials for academic work, such as select monographs, photographs, manuscripts, speeches, maps, and pamphlets. All collections are full-text searchable, offer search-term highlighting, include high-quality images, and are interlinked by millions of citations and references.
Project MUSE This link opens in a new window
This interdisciplinary journal collection provides full-text access to over 300 scholarly journals. It is particularly strong in the humanities disciplines, such as literature, history, and area studies (Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe), but also has content from the sciences and the social sciences.
Humanities Full Text This link opens in a new window
Need to find articles from over 600 journals covering various broad subjects in the humanities including archaeology, art, classics, film, folklore, linguistics, philosophy, religion, and world literature? Try this!

Databases for Periodicals (newspapers, magazines, etc.)

Music Periodicals Database This link opens in a new window
Formerly known as International Index of Music Periodicals Full Text (IIMP), the Music Periodicals Database is an international music resource which indexes articles from journals and magazine. This database includes all musical genres from classical to popular. The Music Periodicals Database is the music periodicals section within this database. It can be searched separately or in a combined search with the Performing Arts Periodicals Database (formerly known as the International Index to Performing Arts Full Text), the performing arts periodical section of the database.
Performing Arts Periodicals Database This link opens in a new window
Formerly known as International Index to Performing Arts Full Text (IIPAFT). The Performing Arts Periodicals Database is a dynamic resource for the performing arts that provides indexing and abstracts for more than 210 international journals. International index for articles from performing arts journals and magazines. Database includes all aspects for the performing arts from theatre to the entertainment industry. The Performing Arts Periodicals Database is the performing arts section within this database. It can be searched separately or in a combined search with the Music Periodicals Database (formerly known as International Index of Music Periodicals Full Text), the music periodicals sections of the database.

Databases for Background Information (encyclopedias and reference books)

Oxford Music Online This link opens in a new window
This music encyclopedia includes the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, New Grove Dictionary of Opera, New Grove Dictionary of Jazz, Grove Dictionary of American Music, Grove Dictionary of Musical Instruments, Oxford Companion to Music, Oxford Dictionary of Music and the Encyclopedia of Popular Music. It is recommended to students of all levels as a beginning point for research.

What is a Scholarly Text?

Scholarly Texts:

A scholarly text is a piece of writing that was written by a researcher for the purposes of expanding knowledge in a particular field. Generally these are published in academic journals or books. Scholarly texts are NOT for the purposes of entertainment, to sell a product, or the spreading news. For this reason you are not going to find scholarly texts in popular magazines or newspapers.

Here are tips for researching:

When in doubt, search for "peer-reviewed" articles. All "peer-reviewed" articles are scholarly texts.
Do your research in a database that contains ONLY scholarly texts. JSTOR is an example of this.

Music: Music Databases & Research Strategies