Board Meeting in Vilnius - Some Comments Only

March 2016, Vilnius

If you are fascinated walking in a medieval town watching old buildings, historical signs, sculptures set up in parks to remind you of the political events of the country and the city, drinking good wine and beer at prices suitable for the salaries of poor librarians, you go to Vilnius and you will have a good time. Join me in November . BAAC invites you to the annual conference. The board of BAAC chaired by the new president Maria Mang from Estonia, met in Vilnius on Friday, March 4, 2016. On the agenda for the meeting was preparations for the conference in November. The programme is not yet made but the topics for the conference are settled. BAAC wants to cooperate with other associations. This year we will work together with Europeana Sounds 2016 Conference. Official representatives for the Europeana Sounds took part in the meeting as observers: Richard Ranft (BL) and Axelle Bergeret-Cassagne(BnF).

Students and academics are welcome to join reporting on their experiences making active use of audiovisual archives for future studies and teaching.
For those of you whose knowledge is limited about Lithuania, the city of Vilnius is the capital. The city is old dating back to year 1323.
The two conferences are set up at different sites in the old town of the city. We went to have a close look at the venues. The photos attached might give you an impression of the venues. The call for papers have not been published.

We have made a preliminary title for the BAAC conference:
”Audiovisual Heritage and People: Connecting, Curating, Sharing ” – and we might add some information about sound recordings too.
What kind of issues do we want to focus on? The programme will content information about the following subjets:
-Access to audiovisual collections online?
-National and international policies and access to audiovisual material online
-Curating of online content
- Academics approach to sources for studies and education : Experiences from different universities.
- Copyright issues of audiovisual material.

BAAC appreciates also other subjects to be evalutated. Few restrictions of the subjects are the policy for presentations of BAAC.
Europeana Sounds 2016 Conference takes place on March 4 after BAAC conference. The venue is Vilnius University. The preliminary title is: ”Unlocking Sound Collections ” – or Heritage?
Suggestions for the programme:
Some of the themes or issues evaluated at the meeting.
-Presentation of music collections
-Old musical instruments
-Presenting online access to the collections with an IT angle for students
-Baltic records on Europeana or local composers.
-Sheet music
-Folk dance lesson

The content of the programme for both conferences is not finished yet as you may see from the proposals.
Do not hesitate forwarding your own proposals or reports from studies made in the different fields mentioned to j.stimbiryte[at]archyvai.lt.

Anyway, welcome to Vilnius in November!

Tedd Urnes
Board member of BAAC