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 ...

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 to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, been forfeited, expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. Because those rights have expired ...

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 classic ...

piano sonatas 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 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 ...

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 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).()

References

External links

Musopen Homepage
* Musopen Kickstarter-funded recordings on Archive.org
In MP3 format
an
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

Mission and charitable activities

Online music library

See also

References

External links