RIP for the LP

We discover them almost by accident in the upper basement of Auckland City Library - 3000, crated and awaiting disposal.

A few have escaped their confines and sit forlornly in worn and torn sleeves on the top of their boxes. Even so, their black grooved skins shine with a defiant elegance that makes you want to hold and admire them.

They are what is left of the library's vinyl LPs - a collection which began in 1957 to complement the music book and score collections.

Initially the records - some 78rpm but mostly 33rpm LPs - were mainly classical, traditional and New Zealand. Later, the collection included jazz, rock and other genres. LPs were put out on display for browsing by category in 1981. Last November the display was transferred to the basement. Today it seems we are witness to the vinyl solution.

The writing was on the wall in 1984 when the library started collecting CDs, which now number 23,000. The format was much more robust for lending and when LPs were damaged the library replaced them with CDs. The LPs were often returned damaged, says collections manager Louise LaHatte.

"The numbers have very much dwindled. We have always had LPs coming back damaged - the classic was people who would leave their library LPs in the sun in the back window of the car. And there were scratches of course."

By the middle of 2004 only 251 LPs had been issued for the year. CDs ruled, with 80,000 issues.

But while the library's LPs may be facing extinction, around the corner at Real Groovy in Queen St vinyl is enjoying a renaissance. "We're selling more now than we ever have," says head buyer Grant McAllum, who has just bought 200,000 from a Milwaukee warehouse that was closing down.

"For someone like myself, who is a massive vinyl fan, it's a huge treat," McAllum says. "It's also an indication of our belief." Real Groovy has 15,000 LPs in stock and sells about 2000 a week. McAllum says it's not just older customers rediscovering their LP collection . Younger people are also finding vinyl pleasure. "It's the warmth. It's the humaneness of that analogue sound that comes out of vinyl that the CD has never been able to replicate because it can't - it's a mathematical version."

There are other considerations too. "You've got the aesthetic deal. People go on about the artwork, the sleeves, the human size of them - that was a big deal when CDs were introduced. A lot of people said they were too small."

Then there's nostalgia. "Vinyl has much more of an emotional connection. You feel it as well as hear it ... there's nothing like pulling a record out of the sleeve and putting it down on the turntable and dropping down the stylus arm. It's kind of a ritual."

Such aesthetic and emotional responses don't play a large part in the assessment at the library, which is implementing the recommendations of music specialist and former music librarian Elizabeth Nichol. Criteria include: demand for the content; whether it is available on newer formats; identifying "definitive interpretations" - a recording of Stravinsky performing Stravinsky, for example, is valuable in any format; the cost of replacement; and what value the artefact might have. Items with heritage value will be retained in the special collections.

What will happen to the rest? "This is where it gets very touchy," says information resources manager Sue Cooper. "It will have to be either really worn out or really tatty for us to withdraw it and dispose of it."

Cooper takes us on a tour of the basement - darkened shelves of sheet music, old videos and acres of boxes of old magazines. "Pre-heritage," is how she describes it. "It's the back catalogue in effect. It's no longer current and popular, but it's not yet heritage material going to special collections to be kept permanently. There's still a lot of inherent value in it."

Some may struggle to see the point of storing items that you might spot in an inorganic rubbish collection, but for librarians this is part of the documentary archive. As keepers of the pre-heritage, it's the librarians' job to manage the material's lifecycle and judge its future value.

And the LPs?

"The bulk of the pre-heritage material probably will be kept permanently. But there is a limit - we don't have endless storage." So while it's possible that a much reduced lending collection of LPs - accessible by request - may survive in the basement, there will be some weeding. The discarded will then be processed under the library's disposal policy, which involves first looking for other organisations - such as Sound Archives or Alexander Turnbull - which may wish to hold the material. And then selling the rest.

Heritage manager Theresa Graham knows about lack of space. The special collections she oversees are full. Here among the rare books, manuscripts, maps and photographs are several shelves of New Zealand and Pacific LPs. There are plenty of early Howard Morrison and Kiri Te Kanawa records. Graham pulls out an LP at random. It's a 78 labelled: Dominion of New Zealand National Broadcasting Service, Address of Welcome to Her Majesty the Queen, Auckland Town Hall, December 1953, Mr J H Luxford, Mayor." Another: "Songs to the Judges. Song-play by Mervyn Thompson and William Dart, Wellington. Kiwi/Pacific Records, 1982."

Gems that will shortly be joined by those in the basement collection deemed to have heritage value and which, while they aren't available for borrowing, can be listened to on special collections' turntables.

Graham says while everyone worries about the medium, conservators are more concerned about finding the computer in 10 years' time to play a certain type of storage device. Or, in the case of LPs, finding a turntable and stylus to play a 78rpm record. But the vinyl resurgence and a market for new pressings and dance vinyl has seen 33rpm turntables make a comeback.

LPs are not the only medium on the way out. None of the community libraries keep adult music cassettes and the central library collection is also being replaced by CDs.

The same goes for audio-books and language courses. "We have been quite careful that we haven't just abandoned the cassette format because they are often used by older customers and we have been waiting for them to catch up in terms of comfort with using CDs," LaHatte says. The library no longer buys videos and many community libraries have removed their video collections in favour of DVDs.

But it may not be long before both CDs and DVDs become redundant as well. The library is giving the Naxos music database a trial. It has about 100,000 tracks that can be listened to as streaming audio online.

It is also investigating whether it can provide downloadable audio-books in much the same way it now provides ebooks.

No doubt the library's CD collection will one day be moved to the basement.

But it's hard to imagine that transition will carry the same weight of nostalgia as the passing of the LP.