The Companion to Irish Traditional Music is now available in digital formats. On February 1st 2013 it was released as an ebook on Kindle and on iBooks. It is also available to libraries on-line through the Project Muse UPCC collection, as part of a greater collection, or, later in 2013 as an individual title; libraries can also get access from CHOICE website by subscription.

This is a landmark for a reference publication dedicated to Irish music, and opens up a huge new potential for the encyclopedia’s use in education in particular. The online formats make it possible for schools and colleges to economically manage productive access to the book’s huge volume of data: searches for places, names, music or instrument references, quoting information or gathering together linked but diffuse information on such as dance or song – as part of project and music programme research.

Each of these digital versions also has the terrific ability to not only find a term or name within the book itself, but will also do a search on the web for the same term. A wonderful way to save time and to broaden knowledge, this ties the data from the book into the huge resources on the internet.This revolutionises the Companion’s potential, making it a highly convenient, valuable, everyday resource for any musician, music lover, music student or researcher.