The Desmond Rupert Adams fonds consists of personal, family, and studio photographs including studio portraits, commercial assignments and personal explorations. The majority of the photographs are portraits. Some photographs depict Expo '67, the Olympic games in Montreal 1976, and street life in Montreal.

The fonds contains a variety of photographic formats, art works, and exhibition prints. There are photo albums, some audio-visual documents and some studio client files.

The fonds consists of materials assembled by Herb Johnson. It reflects his career as a musical performer, combo and dance band/orchestra leader, and musicians' union member and executive, as well as his personal interests and personal life.

The fonds documents the dance band and jazz music scene from the 1930s through the 1980s, primarily in Montreal. It is a valuable source of documentation on the bebop style of jazz that emerged in the 1940s, and of documentation related to the Senior Musicians' Association and Orchestra.

The fonds consists of manuscript and print music, including arrangements by Herb Johnson; personal correspondence; saxophone and clarinet technique books and articles; books and articles on arranging, harmonizing, and other facets of music; photographs; notebooks; personal financial records; programs, clippings, and other memorabilia; and magazines. The fonds includes sound recordings as well as objects including music portfolios, pocket handkerchiefs, and a record carrying case. There are also union-related correspondence, financial documents, contracts and other documents related to musicians' pay and benefits, founding documents, constitutions and by-laws, questionnaires, ballot papers, agendas, minutes, and address books.

The fonds is arranged in the following series and sub-series:

P0088/1 Correspondents
P0088/1A Family and friends
P0088/1B Music colleagues
P0088/1C Personal business correspondents
P0088/2 Personal files
P0088/2A Personal interests and personal affairs
P0088/2B Music industry
P0088/2C Music technique
P0088/2D Photographs
P0088/3 Union activity
P0088/3A Musicians' Guild of Montreal
P0088/3B Senior Musicians' Association
P0088/4 Print and manuscript music
P0088/5 Technique books, manuals, tutors, methods
P0088/6 Magazines and promotional literature
P0088/7 Collection of sound recordings
P0088/7A Privately recorded sound recordings
P0088/7B Commercial sound recordings.

The fonds provides information on Montreal's Black jazz scene from the 1920s to the 1960s, chronicling the lives of three women - Tina Baines Brereton, Bernice Jordan Whims, and Olga Spencer Foderingham - who danced in night clubs such as Rockhead's Paradise, The Terminal, and Café St. Michel.

The fonds consists of materials gathered, and in some cases created, during the National Film Board of Canada's production of Show Girls / Les Girls. It includes research notes, edited sequences on videotape, video tapes and transcripts of interviews with the film's principals, audio tapes of interviews with various sources, stock footage, shot lists, clippings of night clubs ads, historical reference books, and VHS copies of the documentary.

The fonds provides an overview of Myron Sutton's musical career in the United States and Canada, particularly Montreal. It documents the careers of the various bands with which Myron Sutton was affiliated, and those he led, including the Royal Ambassadors and the Canadian Ambassadors. It also provides general information on the jazz music scene and Montreal night life during the 1930s.

The fonds consists of sound recordings and a scrapbook containing correspondence, contracts, programs, press clippings, and photographs.

The Norman Marshall Villeneuve fonds documents Norman Marshall Villeneuve’s career as a jazz musician. It also contains records relating to other Canadian as well as American jazz musicians. Materials in this fonds are dated between 1946 and 2016, with the majority of the documents dating from 1960s to the1980s. Most of the material was created in Toronto, Ontario, and Montreal, Quebec.

The fonds includes newspaper clippings, photographs, posters, programs, magazines, drawings and notes.

The fonds is organized into the following series:
F022/A Newspaper clippings and magazines
F022/B Photographs
F022/C Posters
F022/D Correspondence
F022/E Notes

The Ralph Whims Collection contains documentation concerning Black History in Montreal; the Negro Community Centre; Union United Church, the Coloured Women’s Club; The Red Feather and the Welfare Federation; Railway Porters; the Elks; the documentary film Show Girls; and Jazz in Montreal. The collection is comprised of articles and clippings; photographs; posters, brochures, and programs; books and magazines; and a videocassette.

The Ralph Whims Collection is divided into 4 series:
C012/A Textual records
C012/B Photographs
C012/C Books
C012/D Moving images

The fonds consists of photographs which recall the period during the 1940s when Tina Brereton danced in shows to the accompaniment of jazz music at Café St-Michel in Montreal.

The materials in the fonds document Vernon Isaac’s life as a jazz musician and the Canadian jazz scene of the 1970s to 1990s. The fonds also contains information about Vernon Isaac’s family.

The fonds includes personal documents, photographs of Vernon Isaac’s family, friends and other performers, press clippings, programs, posters, commemorative plaques, and sound and audiovisual recordings of Vernon Isaac.

The fonds is organized into the following series:
P0228/A. Textual records
P0228/B. Scrapbooks, photo albums and other graphic material
P0228/C Audio-visual material
P0228/D Objects