BOULDER — The University of Colorado has acquired 1,400 reel- to-reel tapes containing hundreds of hours of live radio programs with the musicians who defined the big-band era.
The new donation to the Glenn Miller Archive at CU’s American Music Research Center is the second major acquisition in the past few years, and it helps secure CU’s position as the leading depot for big-band artifacts. Miller attended the school in the 1920s.
About 30 donors made contributions to purchase the Edward Burke Collection, named after its founder.
CU professor Tom Riis, director of the research center in the College of Music, said the tapes are in remarkably good condition.
“This collection is especially extraordinary as the material is in a live radio context,” Riis said. “We have the announcer’s voice, the advertising, everything.”
The broadcasts include Glenn Miller, Louis Armstrong, Tommy Dorsey, Count Basie, Duke Ellington and Benny Goodman.
Brittany Anas, Daily Camera
