An investigation was made of how sheet music could be accessed from libraries using a networked approach, examining in particular the suitability of SMDL for encoding sheet music. This was carried out in conjunction with the design of a hardware and software system which led to the development of a working demonstrator. The project has surveyed public and academic music libraries to assess the level of automation and their willingness to accept a system such as CANTATE, and has surveyed the music publishing industry assessing the level of encoding of scores, databases, territorial agreements, scanned images and coded files. Music encoding methods have been studied leading to direct impact on the development of Standard Music Description Language although SMDL had not yet been adopted as an International Standardisation Organisation (ISO) standard at the end of the project. A system architecture for a provider-server system was based on the use of distributed catalogues and databases, operating through the Web. A demonstrator was developed together with a sample catalogue and a database of scanned and encoded musical scores. A model of how such a system could be further developed was produced, describing the problems still to be solved.
Additional information is available from website http://www2.echo.lu/libraries/en/projects/cantate.html.