Library Guides: Public Domain Day: Music Contest: Start Here

Public Domain Sound Recordings

*Please remember as you are looking through the public domain that historical sound recordings may include harmful, biased, prejudiced, and outdated views.*

Citizen DJ
Hosted through the Library of Congress, all Citizen DJ samples are available to use but at least one pre-1925 sound clip must feature prominently in your project. Those are found in the National Jukebox collections.
Internet Archive
The Internet Archive has many digitized recordings available. Make sure the ones you use are in the public domain by checking that the year is before 1925!

To Browse from Citizen DJ

Select a collection you want to work with and select Explore or Remix

To Remix using Citizen DJ

Select Explore to choose a sample or Remix to get a pre-selected sample to begin mixing. The top blue section allows you to change what beat the sample falls on and the bottom red section allows you to change the drums. Select "Download pattern" when you have one you like and you can continue editing in software like Audacity or Garageband.

To Download from Citizen DJ

Select a collection you want to work with and select Browse & download.

From there you can select individual samples, download all of the samples in bulk, or listen to the full songs.

To download the full song from the explore page, click view on loc.gov

Then choose your file format and click Go

Click the 3 dots on the player and select Download

To Download from Internet Archive

Choose a Download option on the right side under the playlist. (.mp3 is a good option for this project)

More Helpful Sites

https://vocalremover.org/
Isolate vocals from instruments with a limited number of free uses
Just in Guitar Tempo tool
Tap the beat of your music to find the tempo