Behind the Sheet Music: Why Performance Librarians Deserve CBA Protections

October 1, 2026

IM  -  

From last-minute transpositions to complex union contracts, major orchestra librarians explain why their work is fundamentally musical—and why at-will employment puts entire organizations at risk.

With a number of AFM orchestras in recent contract negotiations, a spotlight has been turned on orchestra librarians, a segment of an orchestra’s personnel that too often falls under the radar when it comes to receiving equal protection under collective bargaining agreements (CBAs). The International Musician asked the librarians of two major orchestras, along with the co-chair of the Major Orchestra Librarians’ Association (MOLA) AFM committee, to elaborate on their typical job responsibilities, their very busy daily lives, and why they should be afforded the same employment conditions and considerations as their performing colleagues.

International Musician: Thinking of AFM members who may have little knowledge of what you do, can you give a brief rundown of an orchestra librarian’s responsibilities?

Paul Beck, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra principal librarian: First off, I prefer to call us performance librarians. This term includes opera, ballet, conservatory, and military band librarians, among others.

Matt Geise, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra assistant librarian and media archivist: Yes, the term “librarian” is a bit of a misnomer. Although we are responsible for our orchestras’ respective sheet music holdings, both physically and digitally, the bulk of our duties actually involve music preparation. Markings are one of our more visible tasks. We act as project managers, making sure string bowings are solicited from the principals of each section and accurately transferred into all the parts. We also add any conductor-specified instructions. Layout issues, including the size of the parts, the time needed for a page turn, and antiquated notation, require us to call on our experience as musicians to identify any issues that might waste time in rehearsals.

PB: Music publishing is imperfect, so we have a repository of errata lists that identify mistakes. In the absence of a list, we will often research and collect mistakes to share with other groups.

Hank Skolnick, MOLA AFM Committee co-chair and St. Louis Symphony Orchestra associate librarian: Other sundry responsibilities can include music licensing, copyright oversight for the organization, and preparing and managing library budgets. All of these are fundamental to the work of professional orchestras.

MG: Also worth adding, a single work of music can exist in a variety of editions. One of our paramount jobs is to ensure that the editions of the conductor’s score and that of the orchestra parts match, or are at least compatible.

IM: So, that means the librarians need to be in attendance for nearly all rehearsals and concerts, just like the performers.

Emma Luty, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra principal librarian: Librarians set out music at each rehearsal and concert to ensure that everything is in place, and nothing is lost. At concerts, we set out the conductor’s score and switch out the scores between pieces.

IM: Can you give a brief rundown of a performance librarian’s typical training and qualifications to do this job?

Sara Baguyos, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra associate principal librarian: Currently, orchestra librarians have no formal library science degree program, yet we need to have a wide scope of musical skills. Many orchestra librarians acquire the necessary knowledge through an internship offered by a professional orchestra, a summer music festival, or work for a university orchestra during their formal music studies.

MG: The skills necessary to become a good orchestra librarian have to be learned on the job. I’ve always likened it to a trade or a medieval guild. This differs from reference librarians, who must obtain a degree in library science as a job prerequisite. I’d go so far as to say the most important training is to have experience as a performing orchestral musician. The vast majority of working librarians have had prior training or professional experience in music performance. This allows us to exercise empathy toward our performing colleagues; we’re able to anticipate what they need because we’ve been there ourselves!

SB: All three librarians at the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra have a background of music performance. I was a double bass performance major at Indiana University, Emma holds Bachelor and Master of Music degrees in Bassoon Performance from Lynn University and the University of Michigan, and James holds Bachelor and Master of Music degrees in Viola Performance from Boston Conservatory and San Francisco Conservatory.

PB: I studied bassoon performance at the Manhattan School of Music, and Matt studied viola performance at the Cleveland Institute of Music.

HS: Most librarian auditions require a music degree(s), but post-graduate training is still largely on-the-job experience and one-on-one, much like our performing colleagues.

IM: Can you recall some things that went beyond your normal responsibilities—an emergency or odd request that had to be dealt with?

EL: Librarians are frequently called upon to be fixers because the work we do is viewed as magic. Give something to a librarian and amazing things happen!

PB: I was once hired to provide the orchestra music for a one-off concert to promote a soprano’s baroque album. A few days before the concert, we learned the singer sings in baroque pitch, which is one-half step lower than modern pitch. The hired orchestra, however, was playing at modern pitch. The parts had to be transposed one half-step lower, at the last minute.

EL: One of the most frequent “emergencies” comes from guest conductors who will arrive with a score in some state of disrepair and seek assistance getting it in shape for that week’s performances. I recently had to scan every page of an aging score because the conductor wanted to protect the original’s sentimental value, as it had belonged to their teacher.

MG: Every so often we have a pops show or special program that comes with its own set of parts—but then those parts inevitably have issues. They might be unreadable, or falling apart, or we might get blank PDFs and be expected to assemble the program ourselves from scratch. It’s these situations where a librarian is expected to provide creative solutions so the rehearsals can proceed without problems or complaints.

IM: How do your working conditions differ from those of your orchestral colleagues?

PB: We see the music we prepare and provide as our “performance,” so really there are more similarities than differences.

MG: Exactly. We both put in extensive hours of preparation, like practicing an instrument versus music preparation, in order to put on a successful performance. The only difference is that our preparation and performance is shifted forward a bit chronologically in order to provide materials in advance for our performing colleagues to practice.

IM: Can you give some examples of challenges you might encounter in your work that your orchestra musician colleagues don’t have to deal with?

James Nelson, Atlanta Symphony Orchestra assistant librarian: In addition to working with the physical scores and parts for the stage, librarians also act as a hub for the rest of the organization. Because a lot of our work takes place weeks or months before the concerts happen, we face some unique challenges from our instrumental colleagues. We have critical communications with personnel, production, and operations departments. Information comes in and out of the library, which must be confirmed and distributed to other parts of the organization. This means we’re communicating with personnel to confirm instrumentation and players needed for each program, which then supplies the production team with information necessary for the appropriate stage setup.

PB: The librarians are often the enforcers of timelines within our organizations. It’s a skill (and perhaps even an art) to yield actionable information from decision makers.

JN: We also work closely with the artistic department, conductors, and soloists to prepare parts appropriately for each performance.

IM: Your hours typically go far beyond the orchestra’s rehearsals and concerts, which, as we established, you also obviously need to be present for. What’s a typical daily and/or weekly schedule like?

SB: An orchestra librarian’s week is nonstop. We never stop moving.

HS: Because we are responsible for so many projects on both short and long timeframes, we typically work not only when our playing colleagues work, but often on some of their days off.

MG: I often equate our “in-office” hours to those hours our performing colleagues spend at home practicing, doing bowings, listening to recordings, etc. Those are our preparation hours, too! During the day, we often work on tasks related to both music preparation and administrative matters. In addition to the orchestra’s admin departments, personnel managers also need to have accurate information on instrumentation so they know who they might need to hire for a particular program. Marketing also needs our eyes to ensure accurate information in program books, ensure copyrights are cleared for video clips, or even to guide the direction of certain marketing pushes.

IM: That’s a lot of hours.

HS: Our performing colleagues’ individual practice time off the stage is akin to our time spent in preparation of the music.

MG: The idea of equitable service rotation among librarians parallels that of rotation within a section of the orchestra, and also lends credence to the thought that an orchestra should hire enough librarians to enable such rotation. One librarian working all rehearsals, all concerts, plus maintaining normal office hours, plus extra time needed to get a high number of programs prepared, goes far beyond the workload any other musician—or staff member, for that matter—in the orchestra, and is a recipe for burnout and high turnover. Unfortunately, some organizations still see this as a way to save on labor and benefits, while still expecting a full season’s worth of work from one person.

SB: In a single week’s time, I’ve confirmed the publisher and instrumentations for a Lunar New Year program in coordination with an orchestra librarian colleague at the Minnesota Orchestra; finalized repertoire details for a French opera program with a famously difficult-to-prepare opera, including renting materials from the full opera to extract and renting a separate orchestral version of themes from the opera; secured the arrangement permission license to create a new version of a popular song for a Christmas concert; and was on duty for two weekend services of our “Symphony Hall Live” series. The day before that, I added the new set list in the orchestra musician’s folders and pasted in a new ending for another chart. Truly, there is never a slow week.

IM: What is missing for you if you’re not included in your orchestras’ collective bargaining agreements? What will you gain if that changes?

PB: Ideally, an important goal of any arts organization is to retain the best possible experts, and the library is no different. Major orchestras overwhelmingly include librarians in the CBA. Over a career, a librarian amasses a sphere of contacts including other librarians, conductors, soloists, orchestra musicians, and orchestra administrators. Those relationships allow us to pull the rabbit out of the hat when necessary. Solidarity with our performing colleagues affords appropriate professional respect, parity, and job security, and a fair process for review if there are performance issues. If we are treated as at-will staff employees, all of this experience and knowledge can be expendable based on the vagaries of budget cuts or a personality conflict within the organization. Librarians in the CBA level the playing field.

JN: Echoing Paul’s sentiment, it benefits the orchestra to have not only the best people for the job, but also a position that promotes longevity and consistency within library positions. There is institutional knowledge that comes with the maintenance of a collection and the performance practice detailed in the orchestral parts, as well as knowledge of communications within the organization.

HS: Librarians not in their bargaining unit lack collective representation and job security, both of which are significant and central to a worker’s experience. When in the bargaining unit, we enjoy collective bargaining for better pay and benefits, and for better working conditions. We also become tenure track members of the orchestra, giving us significant job security. Furthermore, we can serve on our orchestras’ committees, bringing our unique skills and experience to that work. For instance, I currently serve as chair of our media committee, and with my work on licensing, I’m well placed to assess management’s media projects.

MG: The work that librarians perform is unquestionably musical. The decisions that we are required to make as well as the language we are required to speak—in our work, with colleagues, with conductors—necessitates a background as a professional musician. It is impossible to take someone off the street who lacks musical skill, or even one having that of a hobbyist, and expect them to perform well in a professional music library, no matter how well-organized or attentive to detail they are. Having professional music librarians included in orchestral CBAs validates the intrinsically musical nature of our work and gives us the same rights, protections, and pay scales as our performing colleagues. This encourages solidarity and camaraderie between librarians and performing musicians. CBA librarian jobs tend to attract higher-quality candidate pools and have lower turnover, leading to librarians remaining in their roles for longer and retaining more useful organizational knowledge. Nobody wants to have their librarian replaced every other season because that institutional knowledge is lost.

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