It’s not every day that you hear of a librarian reuniting a composer with their long-lost work. Incredibly, this is exactly what happened when a paper score that needed some TLC was brought to UBC Music Librarian Kevin Madill late last year. I spoke with Kevin, who is the Music Librarian at UBC’s Music, Art & Architecture Library, to get the behind-the-scenes story of how Taiwanese composer Ya-Wen Lien was able to be reunited with a long-lost score through UBC Library, and how two of his scores were subsequently made available through UBC’s Open Collections.
In late 2023, a UBC percussion ensemble who were performing the piece Overture for Six Drummers by composer Ya-Wen Lien brought the score to Madill to be replaced due the paper having become creased and crumpled from repeated use. Unfortunately, there was no readily available information on the publisher of this score or where a new copy could be procured.
At this point, Madill turned to the Taiwanese Composer Database to investigate with hopes of simply contacting the composer, and determining the publisher information. Luckily, he was able to contact Lien, the composer of the piece, and spoke with him through a third party who translated their communication. This is when he learned that Lien himself was no longer in possession of the score as it had been lost over 20 years ago in a flood. Lien then asked Madill if UBC would be able to digitize the score and send him the scans.
Madill then got into contact with our very own Rob Stibravy, one of the Digital Projects Librarians here at the Digitization Centre! The score did not need any restoration or preservation intervention and Photoshop could be used to enhance the image and reduce any signs of wear and tear in order to make the piece easy for musicians to download and read. Ultimately, with some collaboration, the score was digitized and Lien was able to have possession of the score he thought was lost all those years ago.
As a gesture of thanks, Lien gave UBC permission to publish the score, along with another of his scores, Overture (2012), to UBC’s Open Collections. In order for any item to be made available through Open Collections there must either be express consent from the copyright holder, or the item must be within the public domain. In the case of Lien’s scores, the items could not have been legally uploaded as open access without express consent since they are not (and are nowhere near being) in the public domain. So, Lien’s permission was paramount to these scores now being available for download and able to be played and enjoyed by many.
Overture for Six Drummers is a full score, meaning that each line contains the music for a specific instrument. The piece was written to include snare drums, bongos/congas, tom-toms, timpani, wood drums, and a bass drum.
Overture (2012) is the additional Score that Lien provided permission for UBC to publish in Open Collections. This is also a full score, and includes music for eleven percussion instruments: tom tom, wood Block, bongos, conga, cowbell, timpani, Chinese cymbal, Chinese paidrum, Chinese yiun-gong and bass drum, and tambourine.
Libraries and archives are integral to the preservation of art, culture, history, and knowledge, and it is paramount that professional relationships be born of respect, collaboration, and care. Otherwise, beautiful stories such as this one would not be possible.
I would like to express my gratitude to Kevin Madill for taking the time to speak with me for this blog post.
Thank you for reading!
