Music archive of more than 90 million physical tracks needs a new home, but moving will cost $10 million

At one time, most music lived somewhere tangible -- on a record, 8-track, cassette or CD, and while Spotify and Apple Music may make that storage seem like history, lots of music still needs a place to live. "The ARChive Of Contemporary Music is looking for a new, permanent home. The not-for-profit music library holds over 90 million physical tracks, making it the world's largest physical archive of contemporary music," reports Rachel Roberts for Music Tech. "ARC is in need of financial support to find a new home for its recordings." The property ARC is currently occupying is no longer zoned for commercial offices.

Founded in 1985 by B. George and David Wheeler (1957-1997), ARC "preserves copies of each version of every recording, in all known formats, and has electronically cataloged more than 700,000 sound recordings and digitized 400,000," Roberts writes. "ARC also houses more than three million pieces of attendant support material including photographs, videos, DVDs, books, magazines, press kits, sheet music, ephemera and memorabilia."

ARC's current home in Duchess County, N.Y. is "on land that hotelier Andre Balazs donated," reports Melissa Newman of Billboard. B. George told Newman, "We could be forced to move at any time. Without a new home, more than three million recordings and millions of historic materials spanning all cultures and races could disappear forever."

"Over the decades, ARC, whose board members have included the late David Bowie, Nile Rodgers, Martin Scorsese and Q-Tip, has proved an invaluable resource," Newman adds. "It provided research and music for such films as Goodfellas, That Thing You Do, Philadelphia and Ken Burns' Baseball documentary, as well as supplying publishing information to BMI and the Harry Fox Agency. In recent years, ARC has focused on digitizing its collection."

With all that history, moving ARC will be a costly undertaking. "George estimates it needs $10 million to relocate, and he would like to stay in the area as 'access is important,'" Roberts reports. "It has already received an anonymous donation of $1 million to fund the move."