Special Research Collections

To find Michael and Nan Miller’s home in the Los Angeles area, just look in the driveway for a car with the license plate “OPERETT.”

To say that the Millers are operetta aficionados doesn’t do them justice. The couple’s home was custom-built to hold their massive collection of 60,000 recordings, 10,000 pieces of sheet music, 9,000 books, 5,000 vocal scores, and numerous posters, programs, postcards, radio broadcasts, and more devoted to operetta and early musical theater.

The Music Academy of the West and the UCSB Library have renewed a partnership to preserve and digitize the Academy’s archive of open reel tapes and transfer the organization’s paper archives to the UCSB Library, where they will be available for research, teaching, and personal enjoyment. Located in nearby Montecito, the Music Academy of the West has been developing “the next generation of great classically trained musicians” through its summer conservatory program and festival since 1947.

Special Research Collections has acquired a collection of letters from famed author James Baldwin, as well as ephemera related to the Civil Rights Movement. Both collections—which are now open for research—highlight social justice organizing activities during the height of civil unrest in America.

Allen Cohen is one for the books … and the paintings; and the poems; and the films; and the plays; and the opera, jazz and classical songs. And the steps.