Sources for public domain music

November 21, 2010 12:11 PM

Please recommend some sources where I can download classical music.

I'm looking for a site that provides public domain recordings of classical music. Ideally it would be similar to Project Gutenberg only just for music. I'm not sure if there is a better term than 'classical' but I'm interested in music from the 1600s - 1950s, of all sorts; instrumental, voice, solo instrument.

Thanks hivemind!

posted by a womble is an active kind of sloth to computers & internet (4 answers total)

Classic Cat and MusOpen are two that I've used frequently. Wikipedia has a decent selection although they are in OGG Vorbis format (and many are copied from MusOpen, so there is overlap). The IMSLP/Petrucci Music Library also has a number of recordings available. Enjoy!
posted by cvp at 12:21 PM on November 21, 2010 [5 favorites]

PANDORAJAM (pandorajam.com). An extremely huge selection of classical and everything else, arranged by genre. Google: 'pandorajam reviews' to see what users say. $15/yr subscription has ads ... I had this but am glad I switched to $36/yr (only 10 cents a day) with no ads and excellent fidelity. The downloads are neatly filed in itunes by "station" i.e. by ~genre. I have over 3,000 'songs' recorded from ~100 "stations".
I have a mac and presume it works on that other machine, but you better check. Anyhow, maybe it's time to go with mac.
posted by edaphon at 2:41 PM on November 21, 2010 [1 favorite]

Jazz On Line is, as the name suggests, entirely jazz music. It's all in the public domain, though, and the site is funded by donations to cover the hosting costs.
posted by cardioid at 9:22 AM on November 22, 2010 [1 favorite]

I was about to reply to this Sunday night, but then went on vacation for 5 days ... with this page left open.

The Columbia University Orchestra has an audio archive of some of their performances of major classical pieces.
posted by intermod at 7:13 PM on November 26, 2010