Anthi Agoropoulou, National Library of Greece Muhammad Syarif Bando, National Library of Indonesia Birgit Böcher, Deutscher Musik - verleger-Verband, Germany Alison Bullock, Library and Archives Canada Mark Camilleri, National Book Council, The participants of the ISMN meeting Simona Cassano, National Book Alenka Kanič, National Library of Josie Qiu, ICIA Secretary / ISLI RA Council, Malta Slovenia COO, Hong Kong Valentina Chitoroagă, National Book Dewi Kartikasari, National Library of Dr. Bettina von Seyfried, International Chamber of Moldova Indonesia ISMN Agency, Germany Renata Cozonac, National Book Gaorere Kgotla, Botswana National Nino Simonishvili, National Parlia- Chamber of Moldova Library Service, National Reference mentary Library of Georgia Joseph Debattista, National Book Library Botswana Carolin Unger, International ISMN Council, Malta Majda Kotnik-Verčko, National Library Agency, Germany Lucya Dhamayanti, National Library of of Slovenia Mai Valtna, National Library of Estonia Indonesia Eckard Krajewski, DE-Parcon/Acamar, Stavroula Verveniotou, National Library Joanna Eliades, National Library of Germany of Greece Cyprus Wolfram Krajewski, DE-Parcon/ Jamshid Farahani, National Library of Dr. Hartmut Walravens, Inter natio nal Acamar, Germany Sweden ISMN Agency, Germany Coretta Lamptey, George Padmore Aiva Gailite, National Library of Latvia Nick Woods, International ISBN Research Library on African Affairs, Danijela Getliher, Nacionalna i Agency, United Kingdom Ghana sveučilišna knjižnica u Zagrebu, Alaxis Li, ICIA Secretary / ISLI RA Croatia COO, Hong Kong Maia Gomarteli, National Parlia mentary Library of Georgia Neo Mosweu, Botswana National Stella Griffiths, International ISBN Library Service, National Reference Library Botswana Agency, United Kingdom Opening 2 Katarzyna Nakonieczna, National Eva Holst, National Library of Norway Twelfth Annual General Meeting of Kyoko Iwamoto, National Gradual Library of Poland Iryna Pogorelovs’ka, Book Chamber of the “Internationale ISMN- Institute for Policy Studies, Mother Agen tur e.V.” 2 Earth Co. Ltd, Japan the Ukraine Antonín Jeřábek, National Library of the Hidayat Edi Pramono, National Library Progress reports of national / Czech Republic of Indonesia regional ISMN agencies 5 The music industry in Malta ISMN meetings took often place in (Christopher Muscat) 8 countries that did not have a large music Experiences with ISMN Manager publishing industry. We were focused on (Carolin Unger) 12 the quality and not on the quantity of music. ISMN would help including mu- ISBN Update (Stella Griffiths) 15 Chair Person: Dr. Hartmut Walravens sic publications in the national bibliog- Miscellaneous 16 Rapporteur: Carolin Unger raphy and was the basis for distribution and ordering worldwide. Participants: Ms. Anthi Agoropoulou (Greece), Mr. Muhammad Syarif Bando The Chairman then welcomed a guest (Indonesia), Ms. Birgit Böcher (Germany), from Japan, Ms. Kyoko Iwamoto. She Ms. Alison Bullock (Canada), Mr. Mark was active in a music publishing firm Camilleri (Malta), Ms. Simona Cassano Mark Camilleri, Director of the National but she attended our meeting as a (Malta), Ms. Valentina Chitoroagă Book Council of Malta and the host of researcher for her master’s programme. (Moldova), Ms. Renata Cozonac this AGM and Panel meeting warmly She wanted to find out more details (Moldova), Mr. Joe Debattista (Malta), Ms. welcomed the participants. He reported about ISMN applications, why there was Lucya Dhamayanti (Indonesia), Ms. that the National Book Council offered a separate identifier for music and what Joanna Eliades (Cyprus), Mr. Jamshid various services to the Maltese book in- it was good for. Japan was no member Farahani (Sweden), Ms. Aiva Gailite dustry. Malta became an ISMN member yet. In Japan Jan kôdo, a Japanese code (Latvia), Ms. Danijela Getliher (Croatia), in 2015 and, so far, ISMN was not yet system based on the ISBN and the EAN Ms. Maia Gomarteli (Georgia), Ms. Eva popular and was used only occasionally, barcode was used for the identification Holst (Norway), Mr. Antonín Jeřábek despite a very active traditional music of publications. The system was work- (Czech Republic), Ms. Alenka Kanič (Slovenia), Ms. Dewi Kartikasari (Indonesia), Ms. Gaorere Kgotla (Botswana), Ms. Majda Kotnik-Verčko, (Slovenia), Mr. Wolfram Krajewski (Germany), Ms. Coretta Lamptey (Ghana), Ms. Neo Mosweu (Botswana), Ms. Katarzyna Nakonieczna (Poland), Ms. Iryna Pogorelovs’ka (Ukraine), Mr. Hidayat Edi Pramono (Indonesia), Dr. Bettina von Seyfried (International ISMN Agency), Ms. Nino Simonishvili (Georgia), Ms. Carolin Unger (International ISMN Agency), Ms. Mai Valtna (Estonia), Ms. Stavroula Verveniotou (Greece), Dr. Hartmut Walravens (Chairman of the Board, Germany).

22 members of the association entitled to vote attended the assembly. Simona Cassano, Carolin Unger, Hartmut Walravens and Mark Camilleri Ms. Stella Griffiths (International ISBN scene. But music publication was not yet ing well and the industry did not under- Agency), Ms. Kyoko Iwamoto (Japan), Mr. prioritized. The ISMN agency hoped stand the need for another number at all. Eckard Krajewski (Germany), Ms. Alaxis that this would change soon. Therefore, a member of the Japanese Li (ICIA), Ms. Josie Qiu (ICIA), Mr. Nick standards organization recently motivat- Woods (International ISBN Agency) Hartmut Walravens, Chairman of the ed Ms. Iwamoto to investigate the ISMN International ISMN agency, thanked system and eventually to promote the Mark Camilleri for the kind idea of the ISMN in Japan. introduction. As he said, we were happy 1. Adoption of the minutes of the to have this meeting in Malta. The Ms. Iwamoto added that, so far, the Annual General Meeting in National Book Council was an ISMN was not known in Japan, not even Ottawa, Canada, 2017 important institution that bundled and by the national library. The current 2. Reports of the Board coordinated the activities in the whole library’s computer system would not be - Report of the Chairman publishing industry. This was a very able to use it. So, there was a lot to do. good basis for an effective business of Ms. Iwamoto planned to introduce the - Report of the Treasurer numbering. ISMN in her country. 3. Report of the Cash Audit 4. Exoneration of the Board

2 5. Election of the Board 6. Resolution on membership fees for 2019 7. Adoption of the budget for 2019

At 9:50, the Chairman opened the AGM. All members had been invited according to the statutes.

The minutes had been circulated in time. No additions or corrections were Bettina von Seyfried, Carolin Unger and Hartmut Walravens made, no votes against, no abstentions. from the International ISMN Agency in Berlin So the minutes were adopted unanimously. So far librarians had been running the and the publisher database should be IA and have laid a firm foundation for easier to manage. This project also pro- the standard. The chairman stressed that vides for more safety of the data. the present phase needs to be more fo- • cused on the application and use of the Meetings ISMN in the supply chain. The ISMN Annual General Meetings Since last AGM we attended the was created as an important rationalisa- Frankfurt Music Fair, the ISO TC 46 / tion tool for the publishers and the mu- Last year's AGM in Ottawa, Canada was SC 9 meeting in Lisbon, Portugal, and hosted by Library and Archives Canada. sic trade, and therefore it would be de- sirable to win a representative from the the IAML congress in Leipzig, The meeting being again aligned with Germany. that of the International ISBN Agency. music-publishing industry as chairman Our Canadian colleagues organized a of the board. He should be in a better splendid meeting including a very inter- position to motivate and convince his • esting visit of the library’s Preservation publisher colleagues as to the benefits of Centre where manifold ways of archiv- the ISMN for many business operations. At the time of compiling the financial ing and restoring published material of report in early 2018, we can inform you: all kinds were shown. Publications 1. Open fees The hosts of the present meeting - the The latest issue of the ISMN Newsletter National Book Council of Malta - provided information on the 2017 AGM. For 2011 and 2013 one member had not deserves our thanks for their kind invita- It was published as a PDF on the IA paid yet, three countries had not provid- tion and excellent organisation. website. ed the money for 2014, 2015 and 2016. Meanwhile, one of these countries paid The venue of the 2019 AGM has not ISMN Manager all open contributions. been decided upon. Our members will be informed as soon as possible about We were extremely glad to distribute the Therefore, as of last week, open fees for the decision that will be made in administration software ISMN Manager the years 2011 till 2016 amount to 1,950 conjunction with ISBN. to the first 9 agencies, in January this Euros missing in our budget. Another year. See Carolin Unger’s report, page 600 Euros are still open for 2017; alto- Membership 12. gether 2550 Euros.

As of this spring, two new ISMN mem- Website 2. Conferences ber countries from Africa - Botswana and Morocco - have joined. We now As reported last year, the Board decided For last year's AGM in Ottawa, Canada, number 60 agencies, with the system be- to improve the structure of the ISMN the travel costs for the three of us ing applied in more than 60 countries. website and commissioned a software (Hartmut, Carolin and myself) mounted specialist to do this. The website should up altogether to 7849.02 Euros. Elections go online soon. The principle design is not much changed but the inner This is well balanced as we had no addi- The election of the Board was on the structure, the content management, and tional travel costs to other conferences agenda again this year. the connection between website as such during 2017.

3 3. Cash audit As a member of the Board of the International ISMN Agency it has been Since two of our three cash auditors are Wolfram Krajewski, one of the cash au- a great honor for me to take part in de- living in Berlin, we again had no travel ditors, explained that the audit was done veloping and spreading the idea of the costs for the annual checking of our to check the bookkeeping of the ISMN in the world. bookkeeping. International ISMN Agency. He and his co-cash auditors were doing this on be- I wish the ISMN further great success. 4. Promotional activities half of all members. They then have to provide a report in German for the I would also like to take this opportunity In 2017, we did not have any expenses German authorities. They took random to stress the fact that the cooperation in promotional activities such as transla- examples of proceeds and checked with Dr. Hartmut Walravens as tions or printing matters. whether they could find the respective Chairman, Dr. Bettina von Seyfried as Treasurer and Ms. Carolin Unger as 5. IT expenses receipt in the bookkeeping. It showed, as in former years, that the bookkeeping Executive Director of the International ISMN Agency has always been a very We were lucky enough not to have any was correct and appropriate, that all the pleasant one. need for new digital equipment, only examples in order and well done. Thus some costs arose for the regular IT serv- the cash auditors recommended that the Dr. Joachim Jaenecke” ices and as well for the relaunch of the Board be exonerated. ISMN website. With it, we can handle the content management of our website much easier. For this and for the integra- tion of all data of the publisher database we paid 4851.33 Euros for programming As Wolfram Krajewski proposed to ex- work. onerate the Board, Antonín Jeřábek sec- onded this. There were no votes against 6. Office and two abstentions from the participat- Our main expenses are as always the ing members of the Board. So the Board salary of our manager: 29,915.71 Euros was exonerated. and the expenses for our little office: about 5,000 Euros.

7. Altogether, 638.70 were returned to our account due to travel sponsorship As the Chairman pointed out, the con- by the kindness of BII/Goethe-Institut tract with the International Standard to the 2016 AGM in Vienna, and some Organization was signed in December more minor returns for bank transfers. 1993; this year marking the 25th Dr. Joachim Jaenecke, Vice Chairman of the anniversary of the ISMN. After years of International ISMN Agency 2006 - 2018 8. Balance commitment to the ISMN, our present Vice Chairman, Dr. Joachim Jaenecke, Therefore, for the year 2017 we had a Dr. Hartmut Walravens, the present has resigned. As a music librarian at the total income of 48,369.20 Euros and our Chairman and Dr. Bettina von Seyfried, Berlin State Library, Mr. Jaenecke had expenditures mounted up to 49,311.81 the present Treasurer would run again been a long-time IAML member Euros. That means, we made a minus of for their positions. 942.61 Euros in 2017. But if some of the (International Association of Music open fees find their way into our Libraries) and as such had already been The Chairman expressed his wish that in account, we are fine for 2017 and the involved in the pre-history of the stan- the future a young and dynamic team coming year. dard. He sent his greetings which were would continue with the work of the read to the participants: Board. For a start, as successor for Mr. Our conclusion for the year 2017 is that Jaenecke as Vice Chairman of the although we had to spend a good deal of International ISMN Agency, Wolfram money for the 2017 AGM and the web- “Dear colleagues, Krajewski from the ISMN agency for site, we are financially well prepared for Germany, Austria and Switzerland was the forthcoming AGMs. Since I cannot take part in the Malta nominated as a candidate for this posi- ISMN meeting I would like to pass my tion. Bettina von Seyfried written Good-bye to the participants of the AGM and to all national agencies. Mr. Krajewski sent us a short biography:

My position as Vice Chairman ends to- „Born in Cologne, Germany, he studied day at this meeting with the election of a Business Administration at the new vice chair person. University of Cologne (1991-1997),

4 with an emphasis on Marketing and Finance. His academic degree (Diplom- Kaufmann) is the equivalent of a Master’s in Business Administration.

During his studies, he developed his first business activities with the 1995 founding of DE-PARCON GmbH with his brother Eckard Krajewski (Diplom- Ingenieur – engineer in aerospace tech- nology). Since then he has been manag- er of DE-PARCON GmbH and is responsible for projects and commercial affairs. He has extensive experience in planning, implementing and running Chairman and software projects. He has a detailed new Vice Chairman: knowledge of market structure (vertical Dr. Hartmut Walravens and Wolfram Krajewski marketing), particularly in the music sector as well as many years analysing the complex influence of new technolo- would again take place in a European gies on structures of the media sector. country so that travel costs would pre- This knowledge is on offer to appropri- sumably be lower. ate services as well as to advise compa- Carolin Unger, Executive Director, re- There were no votes against and no ab- nies and institutions.“ ported that we had two new members, Botswana and Morocco. So the expected stentions. So the membership fees for income in 2019 should be 47,400 Euros. 2019 were unanimously adopted. 2,550 Euros were still due of member The Chairman had indicated his inten- agencies for former years. tion to resign earlier this year, but as no The Chairman formally closed the meet- candidate had stepped forward he ran Apart from fixed costs such as rent, in- ing at 10:40 h. again for the chairmanship. He hopes surances etc. which hopefully would not that candidates can be found soon allow- change much, the expenditures in 2019 The Chairman then introduced Ms. ing him to step down. would differ from the 2018 budget in three aspects: Birgit Böcher, deputy director of the Mr. Antonín Jeřábek was kind to enough German music publishers association to supervise the election. – The Board kindly allowed the (DMV). She would succeed Dr. Heinz Executive Director a small salary Stroh as chair person of the DMV. The Hartmut Walravens was reelected as increase, according to the labor con- DMV was responsible for ISMN in chairman, with 2 abstentions. tract. There hadn't been an increase Germany, Austria and Switzerland, with since 2012. the actual ISMN agency work sub-con- Wolfram Krajewski was elected vice- tracted to Wolfram Krajewski and his chairman, with 1 abstention. – Next year's AGM will take place company in Hürth (Germany). The IA outside of Europe, so the expenses was looking forward to a continued Dr. Bettina von Seyfried was reelected should be higher than this year. good cooperation with the DMV. as treasurer, 2 abstentions. – Next year's ISO TC 46 meeting The new Board took over from the pres- would take place in Ottawa, so the ent after the AGM. additional travel costs would be higher than this year when it took place in Lisbon.

That means that we could end up with a minus of about 4,500 Euros in expendi- tures in 2019, although we start the year Many agencies had provided their There were no changes in comparison to with a good surplus. This takes into ac- progress reports. Hartmut Walravens ap- the calculation of membership fees for count the expenditures for the re-launch preciated the good work of the agencies 2015 on which had been voted at the of our website in 2018 that should take as documented in these reports and sta- AGM 2014. There were no votes against place later this year. We do not expect tistics. and no abstentions. So the membership high IT-costs in 2019. fees for 2019 were unanimously adopt- Alison Bullock said that the Canadian ed. By end of the year 2019, we would still agency saw a slow rise of ISMN appli- have a surplus and the 2020 AGM cation in the country. Publishers used

5 Participants of the 2018 ISMN Meeting the ISBN instead. There was in fact a He then envisaged how the International publishers you hardly ever met them. decrease in the use of ISMN. Allocating ISMN Agency (IA) should be run in the The publishing sector needed to be ap- ISMNs cost staff and time and the agen- future. During the first phase of the proached from within. cy’s budget did not allow for promotion ISMN implementation the main priority and marketing. She would therefore ap- had been to build a basis by numbering How could one get publishers more in- preciate to have group discussions at the publications and winning the coopera- terested in the basics of number assign- next Panel meeting to exchange ideas tion of publishers. Applications could ment? In North America many publish- about improving the situation. She only be developed as soon as a critical ers still didn’t use the ISMN. In this respect wished the International ISMN Agency mass of numbered publications existed. the US progress report was interesting. would do a lot more promotion. That worked pretty well, largely due to Although the numbers were allocated the efforts of the agencies. Now, we had free of charge, the use was limited. The Hartmut Walravens agreed and added this critical mass of numbered publica- Library of Congress, the US agency, that hopefully a new Board could tions and now we needed more practical wanted to have metadata from the pub- become more active in that. applications. lishers, in exchange. Apparently, many people registered but never used the Alenka Kanič commented that they He hoped that the future chair would be numbers. This led to a lower acceptance faced similar problems in Slovenia. It a person from the publishing scene who of the ISMN than one would assume, al- was sometimes difficult to see if a pub- could better alert his colleagues to the though it was for free. We had to try to lisher needed an ISBN or an ISMN. advantages of the numbering system. find out what was behind it. The US was They didn’t see in advance whether the That was an important task of the IA. a rather new member and publishers publication was a book or scores. She But if you didn’t belong to the circle of were not yet used to the system. was also in favour of having a working group next year.

Hartmut Walravens stressed that it was important to observe the standard. For historical reasons larger publishers in earlier years bought large ISBN contin- gents since there was no ISMN yet. They now wanted to use these numbers up. We knew about that without being able to do anything against it as the use of ISO standards was voluntary. Numbering scores with ISBNs was against both the ISBN and the ISMN standards but these publishers unfortu- nately didn’t care. Coretta Lamptey from Ghana (left) and Neo Mosweu from Botswana

6 Participants of the 2018 ISMN Meeting

Wolfram Krajewski added some remarks it. Today the agency listed about 800 was one more reason for German pub- as an agency responsible for three coun- publishers with ISMN. lishers wanting to use the number. tries, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Germany worked with the ISMN since Antonín Jeřábek from the Czech agency Jamshid Farahani referred to the the beginning. Allocating ISMNs was asked whether the situation was the Amazon problem and said that in his company’s daily business. E.g. last same also in Austria and Switzerland. Sweden they still had those difficulties. year, there were 46 new publishers. The Mr. Krajewski replied that the market in Hartmut Walravens recommended him German agency was a private company. Austria was a lot smaller and the one in to look at the GTIN guide and use that Publishers had to pay for ISMNs, at the Switzerland was even more different. for reference. time of the allocation as well as an an- nual fee. The publishers wanted to have Hartmut Walravens remarked that for Wolfram Krajewski repeated that they the time being, in a number of European had had the same bad experience in the the number although they had to pay. countries Amazon, the world’s largest past. Probably local companies some- These costs belonged to their daily busi- bookseller, was also the largest music times needed time to adapt to regulations. ness. For agencies, it was important to retailer. In the past we had complaints inform publishers and retailers about the from e.g. a UK publisher who wanted to Hartmut Walravens came back to the ISMN. It was also dependent on the ma- fact that the standard had been created at terial, whether it were just scores or register with Amazon but the system re- quired ISBN. We tried to get in contact a time when Books in Print was a big school material. So, at his agency pub- with Amazon but that was not possible. success story. The situation for music lishers used the ISMN and they wanted it. Finally, through professional contacts was even more auspicious: An interna- tional Music in Print might cover the When Alison Bullock had asked him we got an e-mail address but received whether retailers were his main clients, no answer. GS1, the barcoding compa- whole world as it would not be limited by languages – music was an inter- Wolfram Krajewski answered that this ny, whose barcodes Amazon used for national language in its own rights. But changed but that they still had a lively their products (not the 13-digit code but it took time to build the necessary infra- scene of music retails. There were still their own 20-digit code) was ready to structure. In Germany the original many music shops. The ISMN was a help. It turned out that ISMN was not ISMN Agency resigned owing to a nec- special standard with a special quality. clearly mentioned in the GTIN guide (Global Trade Item Number). This was essary restructuring of the company and Ms. Bullock approved that as national updated and the problem thus solved. the ISMN Music Publishers Directory libraries they entered sheet music in ceased publication. Time was lost in MARC records as a separate category as Wolfram Krajewski agreed with what finding a new ISMN agency and regain- a benefit for the end user. But would had been reported and added that his ing the confidence of the publishers. In customers need that? agency delivered data to Amazon. They spite of the difficult situation the Ger- obviously changed their system and now man Agency’s IDNV had a good start in In Germany, applications were increas- it worked. There was a specific situation Europe, and the trade now could not do ing, as Wolfram Krajewski pointed out. in Germany: The rights associations without it. Hopefully it would grow fur- Most publishers had an ISMN and used wanted ISMN for their purposes. This ther and make the ISMN indispensable.

7 Christopher Muscat, giving his presentation on Maltese music

The important research carried out inde- unsigned compositions from the late pendently by Italian musicologist 16th and early 17th centuries, Balzano’s Franco Bruni and Maltese composer Beatus Vir written in 1652 when the Joseph Vella amongst others in the last composer was 36 years old, is officially quarter of the 20th century has unveiled regarded as the oldest known composi- a number of important works by Maltese tion by a Maltese composer since it is Historical Perspective composers. Bruni and Vella were Balzano’s only signed complete manu- responsible for creating modern script. The recording of Balzano’s performance editions of music dating Adiuro Vos under the direction of Joseph Given Malta’s long and illustrious histo- back to early baroque times. This was Vella gives a better understanding of the ry and culture, with temples believed to complimented by the invaluable work of composer’s style predate the Egyptian pyramids by at musicologist Joseph Vella Bondin who (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=- least two thousand years, it is not the was crucial in reconstructing the history WK8CdwBPSs). least surprising to find that music exist- of Maltese music in such contributions ed in Malta way back in pre-historic as Il-Mużika ta’ Malta sa l-aħħar tas- In the 18th and early 19th centuries, the times. However, the earliest unquestion- Seklu Tmintax (The History of Sacred main representative figures of Maltese able traces of music in Malta date back Music up the 18th Century), Il-Mużika music – which until then was still to medieval times and were, understand- ta’ Malta fis-Sekli Dsatax u Għoxrin almost entirely sacred – were Girolamo ably, directly associated with the (The History of Maltese Music in the Abos, Benigno Zerafa and Francesco Church. However, it was not until the 19th and 20th Centuries), The Great Azopardi. Girolamo Abos was born in 16th and 17th centuries that music in Maltese Composers: Historical Context, in 1715 and studied in Malta really flourished and extensive Lives, and Works and numerous articles under and Francesco archival research has revealed unique including those in the prestigious Durante. He was an important composer manuscripts of outstanding level by Groves Dictionary of Music. of both sacred music and (his op- Maltese composers. In this respect it is eras having been performed in important interesting to point out the presence of a theatres in Naples, , and wealth of manuscript and printed com- One cannot possibly understand our rich ) and used to teach at the positions by contemporary Italian com- musical heritage without getting some- Conservatorio della Pietà de’ Turchini in posers at the Cathedral Museum what acquainted with the life and works Naples where his students included Archives, revealing the open attitude of of some of Malta’s leading composers. and Niccolò Piccinni. Maltese composers towards the then Amongst the first local composers of Abos died in Naples in 1760. current innovations on mainland note was Giuseppe Balzano. Born in Europe. Of particular note are the num- Valletta in 1616, Balzano was ordained Don Benigno Zerafa was born in 1726 ber of manuscript copies as well as orig- priest in 1640, later appointed Maestro in Rabat, a neighboring town to the old inal printed copies (and possibly unique) di Cappella at the Mdina Cathedral and capital city Mdina which is also the seat of the eighth and ninth book of madri- died in 1699. Although the Mdina of the Cathedral. After a short stint as a gals by Claudio Monteverdi. Cathedral Archives has numerous boy soprano, the Metropolitan Chapter

8 of the Cathedral helped Zerafa to further John’s co-Cathedral. Later, during the compositions, the most important of his musical studies in Naples under the French occupation, he was nominated which being the Amore Fatale, guidance of Girolamo Abos. Upon his the first Maltese Commissioner of the Frazir and Edith Cavell, it is mainly for return to Malta he was appointed Manoel Theatre and upon the French his activity in the field of sacred music Maestro di Cappella at the Cathedral surrender Nicoló left Malta to Paris that Vassallo is best remembered. The and served in this position for some where his career as an opera composer following recording of Vassallo’s Missa forty years during which he composed flourished, so much that his bust can be da Requiem is taken from a television around one hundred works consisting of seen alongside the all time opera greats recording that I had conducted in 2007 masses, psalms, hymns and motets. on the façade of the Palais Garnier in (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYt Towards the end of his life, his failing Paris. His most important works are wrsWqRsI). health forced him to retire and he even- L’Avviso ai Maritati, Il Barbiere di tually died in 1804. Siviglia, Le Mèdecin Turc, Joconde and Besides his personal achievements as a Jeannot et Colin. The revival by conduc- composer, Vassallo was an eminent mu- Zerafa’s successor at the Cathedral was tor Richard Bonynge of Isoùard’s sic teacher and his students included the more prolific composer and organist Cendrillon had refreshed a renewed in- Josie Mallia Pulvirenti and the prolific Francesco Azopardi (b. 1748) who like terest worldwide in this composer who composers of sacred music Giuseppe his predecessor studied in Naples, this was once regarded one of the most im- Caruana and Carlo Diacono. Both time under the renowned Piccinni. portant opera composers in Paris. Caruana and Diacono were towering Azopardi enjoyed a worldwide reputa- Isoùard’s Cendrillon was written in figures in the field of sacred music tion as master of the art of counterpoint. 1810, making it the second such opera throughout the first half of the 20th cen- The French translation of his treatise Il to be written, predating Rossini’s more tury and much of their music is still be- Musico Pratico was adopted as a text- famous contribution by seven years. ing performed to date. Nevertheless, a book at the Conservatoire Royal de Excerpts taken from the 1999 recording thorough overview of Maltese sacred Paris and Luigi Cherubini regarded it as by Richard Bonynge can be found here: music would be incomplete without “the catechism of every musician.” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1_ mention of the Bugeja and Nani Given the nature of his employment at RN8wgXlA. families. the Cathedral, his catalogue of works naturally included much sacred music. The first composer in the Bugeja However it also includes a number of Another composer with strong French dynasty was Pietro Paolo Bugeja, who secular works including symphonies, connections was Paolino Vassallo (born was born in 1772. He studied composi- arias and a lost opera. Azopardi died in in Cospicua in 1856 and died in Valletta tion with Azopardi in Malta and later in 1809. in 1923). After his initial musical train- Naples; on his return to Malta he inher- ing in Malta under Domenico Amore, ited the post of Maestro di Cappella at The opening of the Stabat Mater by Anastasju Fenech and Giuseppe Spiteri the cathedral from his mentor. On the Girolamo Abos perfectly summarizes Fremond, Vassallo went on to the con- other hand, the origins of the Nani fami- the prevalent style of Maltese music at servatoire in Paris where he studied with ly date back to mid-18th century the time, clearly influenced by the famous composers Massenet, Giraud where Angelo Nani was born into a no- Neapolitan techniques. Sopranos and Gounod. The late Mons Fortunato ble family. Angelo was a supreme vio- Isabelle Poulenard and Isabelle Mizzi, a personal acquaintance and linist and on hearing his playing, the Desrochers, Countertenor Martin Oro nephew of the composer, recalls that Grand Master of the Order of St John of and the Ensemble Stradivaria are Vassallo was nominated for the Prix de the time immediately employed him as a conducted by Daniel Cuiller. Rome from the Academie des Beaux court musician in Malta where he got (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsb Arts but renounced the award as he was married. The successors of Pietro Paolo 41TtZcKw&t=57s) forced to change his Maltese citizenship. Bugeja and Angelo Nani continued in Despite lack of official written the footsteps of their forefathers for well Amongst Azopardi’s most important documentation, it is believed that the over two centuries. Although the com- students one ought to mention Nicoló Prix de Rome was then awarded to positions of the Bugeja and Nani fami- Isoùard (1775-1818) who, despite his Debussy instead! Following a period as lies are still performed in most churches French-sounding name, was born and conductor of the Opera-Comique and around the Maltese islands, both dynas- brought up in Malta. Nicoló, as he was the famous Lamoureux Orchestra, ties came to an abrupt end with the re- more popularly known, was born in Vassallo returned to Malta, set up his spective deaths of Censinu Bugeja and 1775. Against his father’s wishes, he own music school and was appointed Paul Nani in the second half of the 20th pursued his musical studies first in maestro di cappella at the Mdina and century, the last in the long list of com- Malta with Francesco Azopardi and later Valletta cathedrals. It was during this posers who have graced Maltese church- under Giuseppe Amendola in Palermo time that, despite great opposition, es with their music. and Nicola Sala in Naples where he was Vassallo managed to enforce and imple- brought in touch with the current musi- ment the new regulations for sacred mu- As the 20th century pressed on, Maltese cal tastes of the time. Upon his return to sic established by the Papal decree Motu composers felt an ever increasing need Malta, Isoùard was appointed organist Proprio of 1910. Despite having written to free themselves from the bonds of sa- and later Maestro di Cappella of St. various orchestral and vocal secular cred music and to bring Maltese music

9 in line with the latest musical develop- nurtured a kind of neo-classical style in The current generation of composers ments that were taking place in other which he blended his personal harmonic owes much to the compositions and western cultures. In this respect, the and contrapuntal idiom to those of more teachings of Camilleri and Vella. Malta three most important composers were established masters such as Stravinksy, is now blessed with a wealth of young undoubtedly Carmelo Pace, Charles Bartok and mostly Hindemith in whom composers, each with his or her own Camilleri and Joseph Vella. Vella found a most useful source of in- style or influences. Although too many spiration. On the other hand, Charles to mention, one might mention Albert Camilleri admittedly used to find his Pace, Ruben Zahra, Karl Fiorini, Albert true self in the roots of Maltese folk mu- Garzia, Steven Psaila and Euchar sic tradition. Although Carmelo Pace Gravina who have written mostly secu- had already incorporated elements of lar and instrumental works (some of folk into art music, Camilleri found the which are influenced by Maltese folk highly improvisatory style of the traditions) while Josef Bugeja, Maltese traditional folk singing called Raymond Sciberras and Paul Portelli Għana much appealing to his tastes and have shown a distinctive voice in the has therefore consciously and field of sacred music. For the very first consistently absorbed ideas from local time in recorded history we have also Għana singers. The Maltese Għana is female composers, such as Veronique the traditional method of singing where- Vella and Mariella Cassar Cordina, who by highly ornamented melodies are set are also making a name for themselves. against a simple harmonic structure. As a representative of this generation al- There are three main types of Għana: low me to end this historical overview the spirtu pront, in which two or more with an excerpt from the last movement singers answer each other in an of my own Stabat Mater, a distinctively impromptu manner over a simple contemplative and approachable work, harmonic structure (I and V with the IV performed by soprano Charlene Christopher Muscat used only towards the end); the għana Aquilina, the Jubilate Deo Choir, St tal-fatt (the ballad) which is usually Monica Choir and the Malta Carmelo Pace (1906-1993), born in played at a slower tempo and, unlike the Philharmonic Orchestra under my direc- Valletta in 1906, was a versatile and pro- spirtu pront, is generally a pre-written tion lific composer. His long list of works in- factual story; and the għana fil-għoli – a (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo cludes at least four operas, two piano style of singing much similar to Arabic ht_i22vL4). concertos, two symphonies, three orato- music in which a high-pitched rios, four cantatas, thirteen string quar- melismatic melody gradually winds tets and various other chamber and down towards the tonic note which is choral works. Throughout his long ca- only reached at the very end. Camilleri’s Music Industry in Context reer spanning over seven decades, continued interest in this subject matter Carmelo Pace gradually developed an urged him to engage in further research Impressive as it may seem the history of individual harmonic language which he throughout the Mediterranean basin and Maltese music was, fairly and squarely, embedded into the classical forms and his findings opened up new doors in var- the success story of a few individuals the resultant style was totally new to the ious aspects, particularly in rhythmic who strived hard to achieve their goals. music that was then being composed notation. Following are URLs of two Over the centuries, the only institution and performed in the Maltese ecclesias- recordings: The first recording is an ex- that supported the musical arts in Malta tical institutions. However, despite his cerpt from the second movement of was the Roman Catholic Church in the genuine efforts, his music never Charles Camilleri’s Piano Concerto No. form of commissions of new works, achieved the popularity it deserved and 1 ‘Mediterranean’ performed by Andre funding the studies abroad of promising it was therefore mainly left to a new de Groote (piano) together with the talents and the creation of employment generation of composers to fulfill the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra con- opportunities including the post of brave quest of aligning the standards of ducted by Michael Laus. The second Maestro di Cappella at the Cathedral. Maltese compositions to those of recording is the opening of Joseph The local churches (there are some 359 Europe and America. Vella’s Concerto for Violin and churches in the Maltese islands) have, Orchestra, composed in 1993, in a per- over the years, doubled as free-entrance formance by Marcello Canci (violin) to- The leading personalities throughout the theatres particularly during the five days gether with the Sofia Symphony post-war era were Charles Camilleri of the festa when liturgical services Orchestra conducted by the composer. (1931-2009) and Joseph Vella (1942- come complete with orchestra and choir. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dI_ 2018). Both composers took individual For many, particularly those living in NhiNaAAY&t=649s and almost diverging routes but their the rural areas and lacking modern-day https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kKf works are full of creative and innovative technology, this would have been the bi3tyyu8&t=9s ideas. Gozitan composer Joseph Vella only time they could listen to some kind

10 of classical music. This trend must have comprehensive list of the most im - in some kind of cultural activity during been appreciated by the locals to the ex- portant developments that took place in 2016. Music-related statistics did not tent that, by time, Maestri di Cappella the post war era: fair badly either: 67% of respondents took the liberty of performing an over- stated that they listen to music everyday ture from an opera before the start of a – 1960 the Manoel Theatre reopened with Pop being the most favorite genre liturgical service. after an extensive three-year long (24.8%), followed by Rock (12.5%) and restoration; Classical music (12%). The Malta Besides the Church the only other musi- Philharmonic Orchestra puts up an aver- – 1968 the setting up of the first ever cal institutions in Malta were the age of 60 concerts per season, while all professional orchestra in Malta (the Manoel Theatre (built by the Knights of the other state theatres (Teatru Manoel, St John in 1731 which makes it one of Manoel Theatre Orchestra that later Pjazza Teatru Rjal and the the oldest theatres still in use) and the evolved into the Malta Mediterranean Conference Centre) dedi- Philharmonic Orchestra); Royal Opera House (inaugurated in cate a large portion of their events calen- 1866 and built on a design by the – 1975 the Johann Strauss School of dar (in some cases well in excess of renowned British architect Edward 50% of their total annual productions) to Music (now the Malta School of Middleton Barry of London’s Covent music. Admittedly, audiences do show a Music) was set up with the Garden and National Gallery fame). particular preference to the more popu- assistance of the Austrian Although musical concerts and drama lar genres (such as musicals and the an- Government; were popular in both theatres it was the nual Christmas pantomime) and while operatic genre that undoubtedly held the – 1979 the imposing courtyard of the opera no longer enjoys the popularity it highest step of the podium. Unlike the Sacra Infermeria was turned into a did in the opening decades of the 20th local churches, our theatres were very 1,400 seat theatre (now called the century, there are still at least four dif- exclusive and did very little in propagat- Mediterranean Conference Centre); ferent operatic productions every year ing the proper appreciation of the musi- (in Malta and Gozo). cal arts. Only the local nobility or – 1985 first music degrees being of- wealthy families could afford to attend fered by the University of Malta; In spite of this extremely positive an operatic production, presumably and picture, as with other countries, we do more as an excuse to mingle with the have our shortcomings and we need to Knights, the British Royalty or the mili- – 2000 St James Cavalier was work hard to catch up on certain aspects. tary officers than out of true love to mu- restored and turned into a creativity One ought to mention the lack of music sic. The hoi polloi had to satisfy their centre as a millennium project. appreciation in schools, school choirs, a musical yearnings either by listening to national concert hall and a music acade- church music or to one of the local band In recent years, Malta’s music industry my. By time and with the proper support clubs that were being established in each has grown both in terms of quality and I am confident that, given our time- town and village across Malta and Gozo dimension. The country boasts an proven determination and passion, we from the mid-19th century onwards. It is impressive cultural calendar with such will eventually be able to rectify these not appropriate for me to judge or con- festivals as the Malta International Arts limitations as well. clude anything about the level of execu- Festival, The Valletta International tion in these scenarios but one should Baroque Festival, The Victoria A more in-depth analysis of the local bear in mind that any music making International Arts Festival and the Malta music industry would, however, reveal happening outside the theatres was done International Choir Festival to name but other flaws in the system that by time purely on an amateur level. a few. Outside the classical field, Malta may grow dangerously out of hosts The Malta Jazz Festival, the annu- proportion. These include the lack of in- The second half of the 20th century was al Isle of MTV concert, Malta Music formation (or misinformation) that the a crucial era in our country’s long histo- Week and Earth Garden amongst others. local music industry has on such matters ry. Having survived the cruelty of the Individual successes in the field of clas- as performing rights, copyright and me- Second World War, the prospect of be- sical music remain one of Malta’s strong chanical rights as well as the lack of an coming an independent country after points: one need only mention the tenor institutionalized approach when it two thousand years of domination by and Hollywood star Oreste Kirkop comes to publishing of sheet music. foreign rulers was becoming more of a (1923-1998), soprano Miriam Gauci, Some individual efforts in the past were, reality. Malta’s eventual Independence tenor Joseph Calleja and violinist by every measure, remarkable. For in- in 1964 was not only of political signifi- Carmine Lauri (who is the leader of the stance Isouard had his own publishing cance; even more importantly, it gave London Symphony Orchestra). house Magasin de Musique (that he the people a much needed morale boost managed in the good company of his to look forward, rebuild the country and Statistics are also staggering, to say the partners Cherubini, Méhul, Kreutzer, shape its future. While the state was least. According to a study Rode and Boïeldieu); Vassallo’s sacred busy establishing the country’s social commissioned by Arts Council Malta in music was published by the Casa and economic foundations, the arts were collaboration with the National Statistics Editrice Musica Sacra di Milano; and benefitting greatly from this institution- Office and Valletta 2018 Foundation, Camilleri’s music was mostly published alized approach. What follows is a non- 91% of the adult population participated by Novello. However, a generic browse

11 through the Mdina Cathedral Archives expect that a composer could also be a but had perhaps forgotten to put an end would show without any show of doubt manager-cum-lawyer-cum-promoter. to the range. So when the agency had that, historically, there were neither the Composers should be allowed to focus used up all numbers of their contingent means nor the will (possibly due to the on their art and other experts should as- they allocated the consecutive numbers size of the local market) to have music sist them along the way. without notice. I just noticed when they published and commercially available. sent me the contact data of the publish- With the exception of the lucky few who ers and their registrant identifiers. That could afford a music copyist, right up to of course meant trouble, work and cor- Conclusion Carmelo Pace in the second half of the rections at several points: the publisher twentieth century, local composers had had to sticker the wrong numbers on his to laboriously make manual copies of publications with correct new ones, the Before I conclude allow me to thank the scores and parts to get their music per- national bibliography had to be National Book Council for its impecca- formed, naturally resulting in less pro- ble work in promoting the ISBN and the informed, if applicable also trade and ductivity and extremely limited dissemi- ISMN in Malta. This is perhaps one of other directories, etc. nation. Although the church once again the first, much needed, institutionalized came to the rescue of many a local com- Mistakes can happen, to all of us, but approaches and a concrete example of poser by archiving the entire collections s.th. like that would not happen with the how one can assist the local music pub- of Paolino Vassallo, Domenico Anastasi, ISMN Manager. So, from my point of lishing industry. Although it would cer- view, the ISMN Manager works perfect- Carmelo Pace and the Nani and Bugeja tainly be easier to channel informative ly for easy and error-free allocation of families amongst others, tucking away material through a composers’ union, the scores in the safety of a dark musical ISMNs and the administration of the the National Book Council is neverthe- archives does not suffice to have the publisher addresses. And as a very wel- less doing its best to create awareness compositions of these great masters ap- come plus, it also gives the possibility to about the International Standard Music preciated through performance ... at generate barcodes of item identifiers. Number and one would hope that this This is especially important since in sev- least locally. would start awareness on how to over- eral countries publishers have problems come our limitations. Let this be an ex- Nowadays, thanks to the use of music to find a good working barcode genera- ample for others to follow. notation software, composers are creat- tor. ing their own micro publishing houses and are able to market their works Installation of the ISMN Manager is through websites and social media. very easy. The programme comes However this is doing anything to loaded with all data so far sent to the resolve the problems that our forefathers International ISMN Agency. Agencies experienced in the past, basically that of then just have to update these data having talented composers working in before they start to allocate new identi- isolation and competing against each fiers. This is very important because the other to achieve some sort of success. In programme automatically suggests the this respect we are still nowhere close to next free identifier. And if the the extraordinary work that such entities In early January 2018, we were very programme doesn’t „know“ of an as the Estonian Composers Union, the glad to finally distribute the ISMN already existing allocation before, it Latvian Music Information Centre and Manager amongst the first agencies. By would suggest a number which already the Musica Sacra Edition in Poland do now, 13 agencies use this ISMN admin- has been allocated. And this has to be to promote the works of their own com- istration programme or are about to use avoided by all means, of course. But this posers. it: Argentina, Australia, Botswana, checking process has to be done only Germany (which is allocating numbers once, before the first use of the It is my personal wish (though I might also for Austria and Switzerland), programme. After that everything will also be reflecting the thoughts of fellow Kenya, Kosova, the Kyrgyz Republic, run smoothly. composers) to see a more unified Luxembourg, Moldova, Morocco, approach in the local music industry, at Poland, Serbia and the United Kingdom. Another plus is that agencies using the least in the field of classical music in ISMN Manager would not have to wor- which I operate. Having a unified front I wished there were more agencies to ry about sending their publisher data to would create better opportunities with a use it because one of its great benefits is the International ISMN Agency, properly informed approach to the mu- that it absolutely prevents double alloca- anymore. Via data exchange all new en- sic industry in the 21st century. My wish tion of numbers. So for example, a few tries or corrections become visible to me is for a composers’ union or association weeks ago I noticed that an agency had and I can key them into the ISMN of some sort that would take over the re- allocated numbers which did not belong Directory which is published on our sponsibility of uniting us local to their ranges but to another country’s. website. composers, represent our interests, pro- The local IT department seems to have vide opportunities and guide us on the entered the numbers I had allocated to The data exchange is of great ins and outs of the industry. One cannot this agency into their in-house system importance. It has to be done by the

12 List of publishers that got numbers directly from the International ISMN Agency. I can choose myself which columns I want to be shown on this list. agency as well as by me. Otherwise new ing an outdated version. And with just a with ISMN in the IDNV catalogue sys- entries would not become valid in the few steps, I have got everything that I tem. In contrast to the internally used programme. So to speak: I have to vali- need in order to inform the registrants ISMN Manager, this system is used to date your changes. and to provide them with lists and bar publish data on single editions for all codes of their numbers. Another IDNV users (publishers, retailers, The programme is used only internally valuable feature is that you have a com- libraries and institutions). Together, the by ISMN agencies. It is not meant for fortable insight into your agency’s allo- two systems are ideally matched to each the public. cation history and can always re-gener- other.“ ate all lists or bar codes when needed. ISMN Manager is a really helpful tool To show you what the ISMN Manager for the administration of publisher con- When it comes to a listing of catalogue looks like, please view the few screen- tact data and the allocation of numbers, data, we recommend our registrants to shots of the programme on this and the and that means for a large part of your enter the information on their editions following page. They come from the daily routine work. And you can also use it for creating statistical figures on the amount of published items during a certain period, or so.

What you have to be aware of: ISMN Manager is not meant to be a bibliographic administration system. You cannot key in bibliographical data for each item number in the fields that are seen by other agencies or by me at the International ISMN Agency. But you can write whatever you like into the in- ternal comment field, and this of course can be bibliographical information on item numbers.

As Wolfram’s colleague Sonja Genscheit from the German language ISMN agency puts it: „The ISMN Manager application is a very handy tool for my daily tasks as ISMN agency. First of all, it allows me to prevent dou- ble allocations. No need for error-prone Excel spreadsheets on various comput- ers which always involves the risk of us- Example of a publisher entry

13 IDNV:

Let me add, since the ISMN Manager can be a basis for use of the IDNV:

For quite a while already there has been the desire for a global trade directory for notated music. Using the ISMN Manager can be a solution for this for Example of a number allocation many agencies. ISMN Manager then would also be the basis for agencies to gain access to the international trade di- rectory IDNV, free of charge. IDNV is an international database for sheet music and music publishing material. Again, Wolfram told you about it at former Panel meetings. IDNV connects publish- ers and sheet music retailers to each oth- er as part of this business network. Currently it lists around 670,000 editions and more than one million titles The export I sent to this publisher, in this case PDFs of the barcodes from more than 15 countries. Agencies can add bibliographic metadata of publi- weeks, they studied the software and cations into this trade directory which created new records. After checking the improves the visibility of notated music correctness of the data entered with the of a country to a great extent. ISMN International Agency, they started filling the database with data from the So, it would be of great benefit for agen- ISMN Moldova database. It proved to cies to also make use of the IDNV and be a very useful software, which permit- thereby possibly open new markets for ted to manage the ISMN system in their publishers. every country in a better way. ISMN Manager I use myself to allocate numbers to publishers in countries where there is no ISMN agency, yet; therefore, the different countries in the list. A national agency would of course only have entries from its own country or the region it is responsible for.

By double click, I can open all these en- tries and see more detailed information. I won’t show this here again because Wolfram Krajewski described this very well, last year, in his Panel presentation (see ISMN Newsletter, No. 27, December 2017).

From what I heard from ISMN colleagues the installation of the programme and getting started with it in most cases was very easy. „It looks great“, said one colleague. „The regis- tration of new publishers and the possi- bility to customize the columns is very good and easy.“ And Renata List of titles of notated music in the IDNV Cozonac from Moldova wrote that the ISMN Moldova National Agency started to use the ISMN Manager software in January-February 2018. Within one-two

14 company with Stella and Nick as full- time employees. Last year the IIA moved into separate premises in Russell Square, London in preparation for this change.

A new ISBN Agency, in Iraq, commenced operations in late 2017.

Although no regional meetings took place in the last year, colleagues from South Africa and Argentina visited the IIA offices in London and we were able to answer their questions in person and provide some training.

The new, fifth edition of the ISBN stan- dard (ISO 2108) was published by ISO in December 2017 and the IIA published a revised Users’ Manual and FAQs in January 2018. The Manual and FAQs are available for free from the IIA web- site: www.isbn-international.org. The Manual is available in English, French, German, Polish and Spanish and provides practical advice about the scope and implementation of ISBN.

72 delegates from 49 different organisa- IDNV: Example of an edition with its bibliographic information. tions attended the Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Sliema, Malta this year. We are very grateful to our hosts Wolfram Krajewski added that the ISMN and are pleased to note that she is still National Book Council of Malta for all Manager was a good way for all agen- involved as she continues to work in the their kind help and assistance through- cies to perform their daily work. And the ISBN and ISMN Agency of Slovenia. out the preparations and also during the IDNV was an ideal, very professional meeting. At the meeting there were tool. Members normally had to pay for At the end of March 2018 our manage- guest presentations from Chris using it but since ISMN agencies also ment contract with EDItEUR ended and Gruppetta (Merlin Publishers, Malta), did professional work, often as a library, thus the IIA became a fully independent Diana Segovia (Cámara Argentina del the IDNV offered a special status creat- ed newly for libraries and archives which ISMN agencies could use.

The International ISBN Agency (IIA) welcomed a new director to its Board recently – Michel Lanneau (France) re- places Alenka Kanič (Slovenia) who has resigned from the Board. We thank Alenka for her commitment and contri- From left to right: Kyoko Iwamoto, Bettina von Seyfried, Nick Woods, Hartmut Walravens, butions to the Board over many years Stella Griffiths, Wolfram Krajewski, Carolin Unger

15 Libro, Argentina), Mark Camilleri (National Book Council of Malta), Ronald Schild (MVB, Germany), Piero Attanasio (AIE – Associazione Italiana Editori, ) Alaxiz Li (International Information Content Industry Association – ICIA, Hong Kong), Carolin Unger (International ISMN Agency) and María Isabel Deaza Pérez (Centro Regional para el Fomento del Libro en América Latina y el Caribe – CERLALC, Colombia) as well as pre- sentations by the IIA. As in other recent years, ISMN also held its meeting dur- ing the same week and in the same loca- tion, which we hope made it more eco- nomic for those agencies involved in After a long day with sessions and discussions, both standards to send delegates to the participants enjoyed a fabulous dinner with Maltese specialties. attend both meetings.

Renata Cozonac from Moldova had the good news that there were more and more requests for ISMNs in her country.

Hartmut Walravens then thanked the participants for having come to Malta and especially thanked our hosts, the National Book Council of Malta for the excellent organisation of the meeting.

Lucya Dhamayanti from the ISMN agency Indonesia

If not otherwise indicated, all photos in this The German music publishers association, DMV, reported about Wolfram Krajewski being the newsletter were taken by participants of the new vice chairman of the Internationale ISMN-Agentur e.V. (from: MusikHandel, No 5, October ISMN meeting. 2018)

16