Record organization

[CarGuyZM10]

I have seen several posts about how people store there 78's, but how do you organize them? Do you? I am getting to the point where I struggle to find particular records when I want them, and just looking for some different thoughts on how to do this. Thanks!

[epigramophone]

I started collecting long before the invention of the home computer, and what record organisation I have is paper and memory based.

My main collecting interest is opera and classical vocal. 10 inch and 12 inch records are stored separately in artist order, and are listed in a typewritten indexed ring binder. This enables individual pages to be removed when new titles need to be added.

Jazz and dance band records are also stored in artist order, but are not listed as I cannot decide whether to list them by performer or by composition. My son says it is possible to create a cross-referencing index on the computer, but that is far beyond my capabilities.

Then there are the military band records, the childrens records, the folk records, the French cafe singers, the unusual labels, the Pathé discs and the Blue Amberols etc etc.

Yes, it is all too easy for a collection to get out of hand.

[RayB]

Some good ideas here, especially the idea of the notebook. I found a six shelf Udell record cabinet in pieces that I've repaired and will someday put to use. I'm very new at all this and so now my organization consists of two catagories being the small pile or records that I've listened to and the large pile I've yet to hear.

[STARR-OLA]

About record storage,always keep youre prized possesions away from the flock.i learned the hard way by sliding 25 records away from the pile and they fell over against my hank williams 78s only broke 3 but im still .i made shelves and there very sturdy.

[gramophoneshane]

Mine are basically stored by label, mainly because I tend to remember what label different songs and artists are on.
75% of my records are stored in my big Ikea bookcase, and each cubical is designated a certain label, so one might hold MGM's, another Capitols, another Vocalions etc etc. Some cubicals that I dont have enough of one label to fill, have a cardboard divider and might hold two different labels, so to one side of the divider are Vocalions & the other side are Aco's.
Records like my HMV's which had multiple label changes over the years, are put in chronological order, so the first cubical holds all my earliest HMV double sides discs, the next couple hold plumb labels with the coloured trademark, the next has red labels (equivelent to Victors red seals)and the next couple hold 40s and 50s labels. The last couple cubicals have cardboard dividers for labels I dont have many of, like British blue "pop" series labels.
Within each cubical and label, I roughly keep them sorted by genre, and in some case, male and female artists etc.
Another cubical holds oddball labels, with dividers between US & Uk labels, and for German etc labels sold to the English market.

Then I've got a 7' tall office stationary cupboard that holds all my foreign language, foreign label records, and again these are arranged in sections by label &/or language, so there's a section that holds all my Japanese records for instance, and another for chinese etc etc.
I also use the record storage of uprights & record cupboards for table models & open horn model, so for example the cupboard my Zonophone Compton sits on holds all my single sided Zonophones, early double siders, "The Twin" and Cinch labels. One of my uprights then houses my 20s & early 30s Zonophones, with the bottom shelf holding 12" discs, sacred and orchestral 10" discs, the next holds comic and music hall type artists and recordings, with those above holding dance bands etc.

It's not an ideal system, but it works for me, and even though I might still jave to shuffle through 20, 50 or even 100 records to find what I want, when you've got 10,000 78s it's not a big deal.
I've avoided doing the alphabetical or numerical order thing with my 78s, only because theres so many, and unless I replaced every record back in it's specific place, the system would quickly be a mess anyway.

As for diamond discs, I have a DD cabinet that holds my etched labels, and my paper label acoustics are in my C-19, and electrical recorded DDs are in a record carrying case. These are all filed in numerical order. The overflow of etched and paper labels (that I hardly ever play) just sit on the shelf of my A-100.

I keep my cylinders mostly in chests of drawers, so one holds 2 & 4 min wax, and a couple others hold my standard series BA's. Foreign series, Concert series & royal purples are all stored in storage boxes that are labelled with the series type, and some like WWI songs and military bands I keep separately in record carry cases, and again these are all stored in numerical order.
The worst aspect of numerical storage of my cylinders has been that whenever I get new cylinders, I end up having to rearrange perhap 2 or 3 drawers full of cylinders to fit the new ones in, and this happens whether I get one or one dozen new records.
I may have to start to rethink this numerical system for BA's in the near future though so I dont have to keep shuffling cylinders around in the drawers..


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