The Daphne Oram Collection
Collected from Oram’s home and private studio
A lifetime of audio recordings, scores, personal papers, computer code and more can be found in The Daphne Oram Collection. Originally in the safekeeping of composer Hugh Davies, then the Oram extended family, this archive is now on loan to the Special Collections & Archives, Goldsmiths, where it can be viewed by appointment.
When Daphne Oram died in 2003, her heir Martin Cook had the unenviable task of clearing Tower Folly, the oasthouse in Kent that had been Oram’s home and private studio since the late 1950s. Martin asked for help from composer and musicologist Hugh Davies who knew Oram and her work better than anyone. The many recordings, scores, personal papers, software disks and more that Davies chose to save from Tower Folly form the basis of the present Daphne Oram Collection.
Following Davies’ death in January 2005, this material spent two years in the care of Oram’s extended family who then asked Sonic Arts Network (now Sound and Music) to become its custodians.
In November 2008 The Daphne Oram Trust became the owners of Oram’s archive and entered into a formal loan agreement with Goldsmiths College, University of London, that continues to today. With funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council, they continue to make the archive accessible to musicians, students and the academic community as part of the Goldsmiths Library Special Collections & Archives.
The Daphne Oram Collection can be searched online and visited by appointment in Goldsmiths Library, New Cross, London.
Accessing the archive
The Daphne Oram Collection is sited in the Special Collections & Archives, Goldsmiths, University of London E14 6NW.
Access is by appointment only.
Covid 19 update: The library is currently closed to safeguard the health of staff, students and visitors.
Search the catalogue of The Daphne Oram Collection
Search the recordings available in the collection
Book a visit the Special Collections & Archives, Goldsmiths Library, University of London
What’s in The Daphne Oram Collection
Papers and correspondence relating to Oram’s work at the BBC.
Lecture notes, programme notes and correspondence with organisations, other composers and engineers.
Papers relating to the development, funding and prototyping of the Oramics Machine.
Personal documents and correspondence including diaries, school reports and correspondence from friends and colleagues.
Photographs and transparencies.
Original manuscripts of published writings and research notes, performance programmes and press cuttings throughout Oram’s career.
Scores, scripts and workings from plays, TV ads, films and musical compositions that Daphne created.
Notebooks and papers containing handwritten logs of the daily process for transferring the Oramics system to computer code.
Publications, membership materials and promotional materials from contemporary computer and music associations.
Audio of pieces created by Oram, featuring compositions for film soundtracks, commercials, Oramics sounds, electronic and instrumental sounds.