Free Music

After watching My Sassy Girl, I really felt a need to listen to the full version of Pachelbel’s Canon in D (The version in the movie fades out) so I went searching. If you feel the same need, I’d recommend using this page. Be sure to also search for “Canon” on Amazon.com free music downloads. Just avoid the ones which explicitly say something other than “in D” (for example, “No. 2” )

During the search I realized how little known a few facts are. For example, if you want to search for free MP3s, use AllTheWeb.com. They use a similar system to Google but they don’t overlap with Google as much as you would expect. In addition, their lower popularity means that fewer sites try to trick their ranking system.

If you just want to browse, here are a few sites that offer free mp3 downloads:
* DMusic.com
* OSMusic.net (OS = Open Source)
* OCRemix (OverClocked Remix. Source of amazing remixed video game music.)
* ModPlug Central (Has many formats.)
* mFiles
* Classic Cat (Classical music only)
* University of Quebec
* Canadian Music
* Baroque – Pages 1, 2, 3.
* Download.com Music (Make sure you get mp3s and not wma.)
* mp3.com.au
* SoundClick.com (Requires registration.)
* Amazon.com free music downloads (Requires registration.)
* MagnaTune (A “not evil” recording label that lets you try before you buy. If you can’t pay, you can geek the files out for free but come on. These guys deserve the money. They also offer easy licensing of their music.)
* WashingtonPost.com MP3 (Requires you to agree to a “no sharing and only one copy of the file” license agreement before you download.)
* emp3world (seemed OK. Let me know if I missed something)
* FreePlay Music (You can listen for free and license songs easily. The licensing terms don’t seem to be as not-evil as MagnaTune’s though.)

For sites which require free registration, you can save a lot of effort and thumb your nose at them by using a pre-existing login from BugMeNot.com or by giving them a DodgeIt.com e-mail address.

And finally, if you don’t mind your free music being in mod, xm, it, s3m, or another module tracker format, stop by The Mod Archive.

Addendum:
On a related note, John C. Dvorak wrote a good column which gives some nice examples of the counter-productive effects of lawsuits on the download of music and movies. You can read it at http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1736444,00.asp

Free Music by Stephan Sokolow is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.