Enter the composer's full name (last name first) in Encompass Search.
Remember to consider alternate spellings for names that are derived from a language that uses a non-Roman alphabet (for example Russian, Hebrew, Chinese, etc.)
Russian names, such as Rachmaninoff, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky can be especially tricky. For example: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's last name can also be spelled as Chaikovsky, Chaikovskii, Tschaikowsky, or the fully Anglicized version: Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky.
To help with searches of this type, use TRUNCATION to search for the variant forms of the name.
Also remember: some composers come from prolific families of composers. For example, the Bach family included Johann Sebastian, Johann Christian, Wilhelm Friedemann, and Carl Philipp Emanuel, among others. In this case--four composers with the same last name--it's important to know a first name or first and middle name.
Some important sources for composer's names include:
This can help determine the language of your search terms. Any good biographical dictionary should note the composer's nationality.
For example, if we know that Mozart was Austrian, we can presume that many of his works were originally titled in German. Thus it might help to search for the title using the German words.
So, when searching we would need to know the word for a piano sonata:
Thus we would search : "Klaviersonate AND Mozart"
(Note that Klaviersonate (singular) and Klaviersonaten (plural) are compound words in German)
For more translations of common musical words, see:
Don't forget --
Encompass Search uses KEYWORD searching, so your search will locate records with all of your search terms anywhere in the record, and not necessarily in the order you want.
For more information on Truncation or other Advanced Searching Techniques in Encompass Search see our "Guide to Encompass Search"