ReSounding the Archives

Bringing World War I sheet music back to life

In 2018, 4-VA awarded Dr. Kelly Schrum, Dr. Elizabeth Ozment, and Nicole Springer a grant to work on an interdisciplinary project to bring World War I sheet music back to life through recordings and live performances.

Students from GMU, UVA, and VT worked together to select, research, and record music, exploring history from new vantage points in partnership with the following departments:

The result of the project is the ReSounding the Archive website, which provides digitized sheet music, historical context, and usable recordings of each song. Each piece of sheet music featured includes various entry points for educators, students, and researchers to engage with them in new ways: listen to live and studio recordings of each song, view the digitized sheet music, read student essays contextualizing the pieces, or read the transcribed lyrics.

The website also provides full metadata for each piece of sheet music along with a free, digitized version for download. The recordings are also available for download and are offered under a Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC 4.0), making them available for use in classrooms, digital projects, or even for re-mixing.

Dr. Kelly Schrum
Associate Professor of Higher Education

Dr. Elizabeth Ozment
Assistant Dean
Assistant Professor of Music

Nicole Springer
Assistant Dean of Academic Affairs
Assistant Director of Arts Management

Additional Participants

George Mason University
  • Dr. Linda Monson (Director, School of Music, CVPA)
  • Jessica Dauterive (Doctoral Student, RRCHNM & History, CHSS)
  • James McCartney (Lead Developer, RRCHNM, CHSS)
  • Joo Ah Lee (Assistant Developer, RRCHNM, CHSS; Undergraduate Student)
  • Caroline Kelley (Undergraduate Research Assistant, RRCHNM, CHSS)
University of Virginia
  • Abigail Flanigan (Research Librarian, Music and Performing Arts)
  • Winston Barham (Collection Management Librarian)
Virginia Tech
  • Mark Barrow (Chair, History)
  • Marc Brodsky (Public Services and Reference Archivist)
  • Tracy Cowden (Associate Professor, School of Performing Arts)
  • Jim Dubinsky (Associate Professor, English)
  • Tom Ewing (Associate Dean of Graduate Studies and Research, College of Liberal Arts and
    Human Sciences)
  • Brian Thorsett (Assistant Professor, School of Performing Arts)