CC on the Free Music Archive

Cameron Parkins, August 12th, 2009

It has been just over four months since the Free Music Archive launched as a destination for high-quality, freely licensed music. Since that time, the site has developed an avid community and grown to include a number of fantastic curators all while expanding upon the site’s initial catalog to host over 11,000 tracks. All told, the FMA has, in a very short time frame, become an indispensable destination for music lovers looking for freely-licensed music to download, share, and reuse.

The FMA has always offered and promoted CC licenses as a means to share the majority of music uploaded to the site. Today we are ecstatic to announce that CC has joined the FMA’s curatorial ranks! We’re celebrating with 50 great tracks that will be both familiar to the CC community while hopefully offering some new names as well. The launch is split into two mixes – our FMA Inaugural Mix and The WIRED CD: Rip. Sample. Mash. Share.

We’ll be doing regular updates to our collection over the coming months and our next featured mix will highlight some of the great community-driven artists and collaborations found at sites like ccMixter, Jamendo, Beatpick, Sutros, and more. We are on continuous lookout for great CC-licensed music to add to our page and would love to hear your suggestions on tracks and artists in the comments.

Rhizome Interviews Free Music Archive

Cameron Parkins, May 1st, 2009

Rhizome, the digital art and media outlet of the New Museum in New York (and CC supporter), posted a fantastic interview today with Jason Sigal of the Free Music Archive. The whole interview is worth a read, but Sigal’s discussion of how CC licensed music can help U.S. radio stations is of particular note (Rhizome question in bold, Sigal’s answer follows):

Was the move to bring together an international group of curators intentional? I ask this only because I feel the model of FMA is not only informed by the direction presented by web 2.0 technologies but it is also a response to outdated US copyright law and its impact on American radio stations. The reason why so many American broadcast stations are now turning to talk radio is because they are also trying to podcast their content online, and talk radio allows them to side step restrictions regarding music licensing and podcasts.

Exactly. (I just snapped my fingers in agree-ance!) Of course it’s going to be international, that’s the nature of the web. And that’s one reason we offer Creative Commons licenses — they adapt out-dated copyright law to fit the world wide web.

The FMA has already become a fantastic resource for curated CC-licensed music and is a database that looks to continue to grow in quality and quantity over time – see featured curators dublab and CASH Music for two prime examples. Also, be sure to check out our initial coverage of their launch for more information.

The Free Music Archive Launches

Fred Benenson, April 6th, 2009

On Saturday WFMU celebrated the launch of its new website, The Free Music Archive.

Today, the community opens its doors to the public though is still in beta for now.

Since there is so much content on the site, the FMA is featuring particular curators such as WFMU, KEXP, and dublab.

So go register an account, and start downloading some of the 5,000 tracks already posted, or search by license type (special kudos to WFMU for incorporating some non-standard license search options here), and help one of the world’s greatest independent stations thrive on the net!

Saturday in NY: launch party for the Free Music Archive

Eric Steuer, March 31st, 2009

The Free Music Archive’s launch date is nearing, and there’s a party in Brooklyn this Saturday, April 4, to celebrate. If you’re not yet familiar with the project, the FMA is an online music library developed by the legendary freeform radio station WFMU and curated by partners including KEXP and Dublab. From FMA’s Jason Sigal:

Every track [on the FMA] will be offered in high-quality without restrictions, registration, advertisements or fees. Many grant additional rights under Creative Commons agreements, making the FMA a valuable resource for podcasters, video producers, remix artists, and others in search of legal audio.  […] Radio has always offered free access to curated audio, and the Free Music Archive is a continuation of that purpose designed for the Internet era.

Saturday’s party (see full details below) will have live performances by a bunch of great bands – Thee Oh Sees, Excepter, Sightings, and Pink Skull (mp3s by all of the acts who are playing are available here) – plus a DJ set from WFMU music director Brian Turner. WFMU will broadcast live from the event at 91.1-FM in New York and wfmu.org. Live recordings from the concert will be made available for download at the Free Music Archive.

Here’s all the info:

Free Music Archive launch party (curated by WFMU)
Saturday April 4th, doors 7pm, show 8pm sharp, 18+
@ The Bell House: 149 7th St, Brooklyn [map]
Admission: $10 adv. tix (available here) or a roll of the dice
11pm Thee Oh Sees (San Francisco, In The Red Records)
10pm Excepter (Brooklyn electronic-improv)
9pm Sightings (NYC kinetic noise-rock)
8pm Pink Skull (Philly kraut-house)

NYTimes Recommends CC for Free Music Downloads

Cameron Parkins, September 4th, 2008

Yesterday, the New York Times published an article titled “Free Music Downloads Without the Legal Peril ” in which they gave CC a nice plug:

Creative Commons is a site that helps copyright holders decide which rights they want to share — for instance making songs free for personal use and distribution, but not for sampling or commercial use. The five-year-old organization said it had licensed about 1 million songs, and lists them at creativecommons.org/legalmusicforvideos. One user of Creative Commons, the eclectic radio station WFMU-FM, posts legal in-studio performances at freemusicarchive.org.

The article mentions some other free music alternatives (such as promos on iTunes and Amazon MP3) and although it doesn’t exactly nail what we do – we haven’t licensed any songs ourselves, that is all thanks to YOU in the CC community – it is great to be featured regardless.