CNRS – Musée de l’Homme

Based in Paris, France, the audio archives of the CNRS – Musée de l’Homme gather commercial and unpublished recordings of music and oral traditions from around the world, from 1900 to the present. It consists of diverse types of media (wax cylinders, 78 rpm, vinyl records, and magnetic tapes, audio CDs, born digital records). These archives are among the most important in Europe in terms of quality, quantity and diversity.

The audio archives of the CNRS – Musée de l’Homme are managed by the Centre for Research in Ethnomusicology (CREM). CREM falls under the former Ethnomusicology Department of the Musée de l’Homme that operated from 1929 to 2008 and has been part of the Research Team in Ethnology and Comparative Sociology since 2007. CREM is dedicated to the study of music practices and knowledge from around the world including African countries such as Algeria, Ghana, Senegal, Angola, Madagascar, Sudan, Cote de Voire and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The centre’s archives are based on ethnography and a systematic collection of music data, its approach relates to anthropology of music recorded in its socio-cultural, aesthetic, formal, acoustic, kinesthetic and cognitive dimensions.

The center investigates various research topics such as the integration of musical and choreographic skills, cultural and cognitive production of musical emotion, and among others, the construction and emergence of musical systems.

The recordings are in various formats, including wax cylinders, 78 rpm, vinyl records, magnetic tapes, audio CDs and born digital records. The archives include over 30 000 unpublished sound documents, representing about 4 000 hours of recordings of unpublished fieldworks, over 13 000 published materials and 199 countries with over 1 200 ethnic and social groups represented. CNRS currently has about 12 000 recordings available for listening with free access while the others require an access code. Requests for an access code can be sent to the CNRS via email.