Hong Kong Music Collection

In order to extensively collect materials related to Hong Kong music, to develop the understandings of preservation of Hong Kong music archive and to encourage studies and researches on Hong Kong music, the Hong Kong Public Libraries, the Hong Kong Arts Development Council (HKADC) and the Composers and Authors Society of Hong Kong (CASH) have jointly organized a "Hong Kong Music Collection Campaign" and the campaign has been launched since December 2001.

Through the supports and generous donations from over 190 local musicians and music institutes, the library has successfully collected over 65,000 items of music documents as at the end of December 2009. These valuable items include the manuscripts of music scores, lyrics and opera scripts, audio-visual materials, photos, leaflets, house programmes or posters of musical performance as well as newspaper clippings, etc. After general conservation and cataloguing, these materials will be kept in the Arts Resource Centre of Hong Kong Central Library and are available for reference use by readers and researchers in the Arts Document Reading Room of the library.

So as to introduce these valuable collectibles to the general public and to further promote the campaign, the Arts Resource Centre had regularly organized various kinds of outreach activities during the past few years. These include the "Music Encounter: Exhibition of Ng Tai-kong's works" held in September 2003, "A memorandum of Hong Kong music: The Legend of Six Maestros" the Centre jointly organized with the International Association of Theatre Critics (Hong Kong) in February 2004, "Treasures of Music: An exhibition of Hong Kong music documents collected" in September, "Lyrics exhibition of Richard Lam" in December of the same year, "The Weed Poet --- A memorial exhibition of Harold Han-tseung WEI" held in October 2005, "Convention vs. Refinement: Canto-pop & Hong Kong Culture" the Centre jointly organized with the International Association of Theatre Critics (Hong Kong) in January and February 2006.

The Centre also organized  "Cantonese Narrative Song Naamyam: Hong Kong's Cultural Treasure" with the Chinese Music Archive of the Department of Music, the Chinese University of Hong Kong in May 2007,"KEI Shang-tong Music Documents Exhibition" in July of the same year, "Three Maestros: Pioneers to Hong Kong Music" exhibition held in May to September 2008, "Sketch of TV Drama Songs" exhibition held in October 2008 to Feb 2009, "Listening to Chinese Music" jointly organized by the Centre and the Chinese Music Archive of the Department of Music, the Chinese University of Hong Kong in March to April 2009, "A glimpse of children's music in Hong Kong" exhibition held in March to June 2009, "SO Yung and YIP Shiu-tuck -- the 2 Cantonese Opera Scriptwriters in Hong Kong" exhibition held in July to October of the same year and "Listen to Movies -- the Mandarin Film Music in early Hong Kong" exhibition held in November 2009 to February 2010.

Donations of music documents are always welcomed. Any donations and enquiries can be directed to 2921 0259, the Arts Resource Centre of Hong Kong Central Library.