Benedictine convent of St. Andreas in Sarnen

Tuesday, January 10, 2017

RISM Switzerland is pleased to announce that the description of all sources from the historical music library of the St. Andreas convent in Sarnen have been published online in the database of the Swiss RISM Office. Thus, a total of around 10,000 new database entries are available for research and musical practice, documenting an important collection in the context of Swiss music sources.

A long-term project, started in 2003, has come to an end with the publication of the data. The historical flood of August 2005, during which the convent’s entire musical collection was under water, was a dramatic event which led to delays in the processing of the historical sources. After dehydrating and re-sorting all documents and after their comprehensive restoration, the cataloging was resumed. This was initially carried out by the Swiss RISM Office and from 2010 by Dr. Gabriella Hanke Knaus.

From now on the sources can be consulted by appointment in the newly created visitor room of the library. The terms of use can be found on the homepage of the music library.