The Louisa F. France Collection documents over six decades of musical performances staged in the United States and Europe. Measuring 4.2 linear feet, the collection is organized chronologically and represents a wide spectrum of classical performers and musical styles. The earliest programs date back to 1920s performances by Sergey Rachmanioff (1873-1943) and Jascha Heifetz (1901-87) at the Lyric Theatre in Baltimore, Maryland. Other key performance venues in the United States represented in the collection include the Metropolitan Opera House, Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall in New York City as well as the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C.

Of special interest to researchers are the pre-World War II programs from Vienna and Salzburg, Austria; Munich, Dresden and Bayreuth, Germany; and Paris, France in the months leading up to the Nazi occupation. There are also several post-war items from London, England; Cremona, Italy; Brussels, Belgium; Innsbrook, Austria; Gottingen and Nurnberg, Germany.

In the late 1940s, Ms. France moved to Nashville with her husband, Dr. Richard France (Vanderbilt University Medical School Faculty 1948-85), where she and Dr. France patronized the local performance art scene. Items representing music programs staged at various churches in Nashville as well as those presented by George Peabody College for Teachers, Fisk University, Blair School of Music and the Nashville Symphony all are included in this collection.

Also included in the collection is small cache of booklets on English and European luthiers, composers and historic sites as well as souvenir programs for the Vienna Boys Choir, Leopold Stokowski and the All-American youth Orchestra, and Robert Shaw’s Choral Ensemble. The items contained herein complement a collection of commemorative coins from Austria. Minted from 1929 – 1937, the series honors composers and artists including Franz Schubert, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Franz Joseph Hayden. Although some items are seventy years old, the overall condition of the materials in the collection is stable and good.