Musopen Inc. is a
501(c)(3)
A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...
non-profit organization located in
Tarzana, California
Tarzana is a suburban neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles, California. Tarzana is on the site of a former ranch owned by author Edgar Rice Burroughs. It is named after Burroughs' fictional jungle hero, Tarzan.
Histo ...
, launched by Aaron Dunn in 2005. It aims to "set music
free" by providing music to the public free of charge, without copyright restrictions.
Mission and charitable activities
Musopen provides an online library of
public domain
The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work
A creative work is a manifestation of creative effort including fine artwork (sculpture, paintings, drawing, sketching, performance art), dance, writing (literature), filmmaking, ...
music recordings and sheet music. It also raises money to finance classical music recordings which are released into the public domain.
In 2008, Musopen released newly commissioned recordings of the 32
Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...
piano sonatas Piano sonatas may refer to:
* Piano sonatas (Beethoven)
* Piano sonatas (Boulez)
Pierre Boulez composed three piano sonatas: the First Piano Sonata in 1946, the Second Piano Sonata in 1947–48, and the Third Piano Sonata in 1955–57 with further ...
into the public domain.
In 2010, the site organized a fundraiser via
Kickstarter
Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...
to commission recordings of a larger repertoire, raising a total of $68,359, more than six times their initial target of $11,000. In July 2012, Musopen announced that the editing of the recordings was finished, after which the audio files were uploaded to its website and
Archive.org
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
. The final list of music was announced in August 2012.
In September 2013, a new Kickstarter fundraiser was launched by Musopen to record the complete works of
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leadin ...
. The fundraiser was successful, exceeding the funding goal of $75,000 by over $15,000. All recording for this project has been finished and editing was completed in April 2015.
Online music library
Musopen operates under a
freemium
Freemium, a portmanteau of the words "free" and "premium," is a pricing strategy by which a basic product or service is provided free of charge, but money (a premium) is charged for additional features, services, or virtual (online) or physical (o ...
model, in that some content is available free of charge, but premium downloads (HD) require a subscription. Sheet music is available for download to all for free, and recordings can be played using an
HTML5
HTML5 is a markup language used for structuring and presenting content on the World Wide Web. It is the fifth and final major HTML version that is a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) recommendation. The current specification is known as the HTML ...
player. Non-paying users can download music recordings but are restricted to 5 downloads per day; members paying $55 per year receive unlimited downloads of
losslessly encoded music; and "benefactors" paying $240 per year may in addition request recordings (as of October 2018).
[()]
See also
*
Open Goldberg Variations
The Open Goldberg Variations is a non-profit project that created a high quality studio recording and typeset score of Johann Sebastian Bach's Goldberg Variations, and placed them directly into the public domain. By releasing an entirely free ve ...
*
History of music
Although definitions of music vary wildly throughout the world, every known culture partakes in it, and it is thus considered a cultural universal. The origins of music remain highly contentious; commentators often relate it to the origin of ...
*
Public domain music
Public domain music is music to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply.
Background
The length of copyright protection varies from country to country, but music, along with most other creative works, generally enters the public do ...
*
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
References
External links
Musopen Homepage* Musopen Kickstarter-funded recordings on Archive.org
In MP3 formatan
as multi-track high quality WAV files(not suitable for end users)
{{Authority control
Kickstarter projects
Online music and lyrics databases
Public domain music
Tarzana, Los Angeles
Internet properties established in 2005
2005 establishments in California
Organizations based in Los Angeles County, California