Disco Pirata

This is a free "pirate disc" sampler from Barcelona Sonora, a group of professionals in the arts in Spain. They are graphic designers, photographers, web developers, promoters, and t-shirt designers who promote the Creative Commons "paradigm shift" parallel to their commercial work. The complete "gold box set" of the entire pirate disc series (110 tracks) is available through P2P thanks to Barcelona Sonora. Read more about their mission with this disc from the official Barcelona Sonora site (in Spanish).

The selections in this diverse yet fluid compilation can be classified as Alternative Hip-Hop, Big Band/Swing, Dance, Dub, Folk, Latin, Metal, Pop, Rock, and Synth Pop.

license: Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Spain License

Weekend Sunshine

Here are five collections of free and legally shared tunes to bring sunshine to your weekend! There is something here for everyone and something for any occasion. Feast your ears!

FreeMusicArchive.org player:

• Click artist name for more from this artist.
• Click "i" or song title for license and song info.
• Click down arrow picture to download song.
• Click DOWNLOAD ALBUM to download all tracks at once in a zip.

MEU CORAÇÃO É BRASILEIRO

ABOUT: Brazilian flavors from old traditional folk songs to favela funk
TAGGED AS: funk carioca, favela funk, baile funk, pop, folk, brazil, afro-brazilian, brazilian

TOYLAND

ABOUT: Bouncy, boingy, squeaky, squirmy, twinkling, sparkling! Welcome to a wonderful world of toys, ear candy, and giggles brought to you by Thiaz Itch, El Zoologico, Gangpol & Mit, Cindy Sizer, Lawrence Power, The Bran Flakes, Christian Bjoerklund, René Vis, 8bit Betty, Valzi & Zinger, and Bubblyfish!
TAGGED AS: synth pop, novelty, pop, experimental pop, toyland, toys, chip music, children, childrens music

KAIRAKUDA: AFRICAN WATER

TAGGED AS: international, world, african, africa, north african

UPDATE 06/14/10: Just learned that Kairakuda has a second African mix that you might also enjoy.

MACEDONIA: THE HARMONIC EQUIVALENT OF RUN-ON SENTENCES...

ABOUT: "... made with a road trip mixtape aesthetic in mind, but it should work as well for office cubicle therapy. Be it hip-hop or minimal techno, be it quirky and upbeat click and glitch-laden electronics, from the smooth and introspective to the edgy and erratic"

JASON: INTERNATIONAL SOUNDS 2009

ABOUT: Argentina, Mali, Haiti, Eastern Europe, India, and performances on Transpacific Sound Paradise

Many more to come! Hopefully some by YOU.

FMA New Webjay

Once upon a time, there was a website called Webjay that employed cutting edge software of the day to create playlists of music files from the web. Users were able to create, save, and share these playlists. Today, we have the Free Music Archive for making those mixes, playlists, mixtapes, or compilations.

The beauty of the remarkable music in your playlists at the Free Music Archive is that it is all free and legally shared. Copyright issues were always a problem with Webjay.

I loved Webjay. It was exciting to hear new music from people worldwide. My playlist of Brazilian music at Webjay went viral with online popularity and surprisingly landed in the New York Times in 2004. Yahoo purchased Webjay in 2006 and closed the site in 2007.

Today, the wonderful Free Music Archive offers us all a playground for creating playlists of music we enjoy for free. Those playlists can be embedded anywhere on the web. Playlists of compiled tunes are available for download with one click. That's just one of the many excellent features available at the FMA.

We all now have the power to create, share, embed, and download mixtapes and share new artists with our friends -- and all for free! Thank you, Free Music Archive! See you there!

[Fellow webjays, you can find Webjay on Facebook, and there is also a Webjay group on Facebook.]

Bach for Piano

Brazillian pianist Felipe Sarro performs original works by German Baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach, as well as nine transcriptions of Bach's work for piano by Russian composer Alexander Ilyich Siloti. Sarro performed all pieces on a Grotrian-Steinweg Concertino piano.

There are over 1,000 known compositions by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). The Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (Bach Works Catalogue) is a numbering system identifying his compositions. The prefix BWV, followed by the work's number is the shorthand identification for Bach's compositions. The works in the BWV are grouped thematically, not chronologically.

Sarro begins this CD of 18 pieces with one of the six suites written for the clavier (harpsichord or clavichord) between 1722 and 1725 known as "The French Suites." The suite is followed by the Sinfonia No. 11 in G minor. It is part of the "Inventions and Sinfonias," a collection of 30 short keyboard compositions composed between 1685 and 1750, consisting of fifteen inventions (two-part contrapuntal pieces) and fifteen sinfonias (three-part contrapuntal pieces). They were originally written by Bach as exercises for the musical education of his students. He titled the collection:

"Honest method, by which the amateurs of the keyboard – especially, however, those desirous of learning – are shown a clear way not only (1) to learn to play cleanly in two parts, but also, after further progress, (2) to handle three obligate parts correctly and well; and along with this not only to obtain good inventions (ideas) but to develop the same well; above all, however, to achieve a cantabile style in playing and at the same time acquire a strong foretaste of composition."

Quite the title!

READ MORE

License: Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic

Five Happy Tunes

SKÅPMAT is a happy EP of instrumentals from Swedish producer Christian Björklund. It slips from dub beats into delicate minimal electronica effortlessly. Some of the tracks Björklund composed for a video game. All tracks are podsafe and are excellent radio beds.

License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License

Charlie Lewis Returns Today Only

Katya here with some fun news! Charlie Lewis, one of my all-time favorite WFMU DJs, returns to WFMU for one show this morning. He is filling in for Ken from 9 AM to noon (EST). This is Charlie's first time back on the air at WFMU since leaving the NYC metro area over two and a half years ago.

You can listen live through WFMU. The show will also be archived in both Charlie's WFMU show archives and in his Being Slowly Nowhere archives. [You can bet that I'll be there chatting, so please do say hello!]

There will be no "Busy Doing Nothing" show this Thursday on his current station WVEW.

Some of you in the know will remember Charlie and pal Todd's childhood antics with a tape recorder on Comfort Stand Recordings. If you haven't heard those gems, give yourself a treat and a giggle by streaming or downloading Party Fun With Recorders. (more from Charlie at Comfort Stand)

UPDATE: THAT WAS A FUN SHOW!! Enjoy it again here:
http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/36106

New Breed of Brazilian Artists

If yesterday's post about Mombojó has piqued your interest in the new breed of Brazilian artists, you might also enjoy the free albums available from Brasil Música e Artes. They offer free compilations of new music from Brazil from the traditional to the avant garde. They also offer two great albums from forró artists Naurêa (album: SAMBAIÃO) and the legendary Gilberto Monteiro (album: GILBERTO MONTEIRO). Enjoy!

License: traditional copyrights

Mombojó is also offering their latest album AMIGO DO TEMPO for free at their website right now.

License for AMIGO DO TEMPO: unknown, not stated

Manguebeat from Mombojo

The manguebeat movement is a cultural movement created circa 1991 in the city of Recife in Northeast Brazil as a response to the city's cultural and economical stagnation.

The original movement named itself mangue bit, "mangue" for Recife's mangroves and "bit" to the computer bit central to the movement's electronic music influences. Since then, mangue bit has been more commonly called manguebeat.

The stylistic origins of the music are in maracatu, punk rock, hip hop, samba, Brazilian folk music, and psychedelic rock. The first wave appeared in the 1990s. Mombojó is part of the second wave of the manguebeat movement. They were featured in MTV's coverage (Sintonizando Recife) of manguebeat along with fellow bands China and Maquinado.

Enjoy Mombojó's album NADADENOVO at the FMA. Here is a taste.

Nadadenovo by Mombojo is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 Brazil License.

The Kazoo Funk Orchestra

Glasgow has been a center of learning since the middle ages. It was the focus of the Scottish Enlightment in the 18th century. It has been the site of major leaps in engineering. It has been a city of fearless, forward thinking people for centuries. Glasgow's Kazoo Funk Orchestra approaches pop music with the same fearless Scottish method. They are a pop band having fun and inviting you in on the joke.

Fall in love with Scottish fearlessness -- even in pop music! Enjoy the albums MIDNIGHT FINGER PAINTER and ADVENTURES IN FUZZY FELT LAND in full at the FMA. Here are a couple of tunes to get you started.

Midnight Finger Painter by Kazoo Funk Orchestra is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) License.

Adventures in Fuzzy Felt Land by Kazoo Funk Orchestra is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) License.

More Gifts from Digi G'Alessio

Remember Love, Beats and Pina Coladas? Yeah, that is a fun album! Guess what! Here are two more free albums with a very different sound from the dancefloor packers on Love, Beats and Pina Coladas. This time it is more dub with ghetto blasting beats. It is all still free for you. What a nice guy Digi G'Alessio is!

Genres: Dance, Dubstep, Electronic, Hip-Hop, Trip-Hop

album licenses:

L'Attentato ai Mondiali by Digi G'Alessio is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Italy License.

The Rain Book by Digi G'Alessio is licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License.

Screamers, Fanfares, Overtures

Breathtaking feats of agility, strength, and acrobatics! Step right up and enjoy the sounds of the circus as performed by the Bensenville Municipal Band! Maestro Fred Lewis and his band take you to the big top to show you the clowns, the gravity-defying high wire act, and the ever popular sideshows!

This set of 25 circus pieces includes fanfares, overtures, and screamers. A screamer is a circus march, particularly an upbeat march intended to excite the audience during the show. Screamers were mostly composed in a 60-year period (1895 – 1955). Circuses were in need of music that would stir the audience into a frenzy.

This album might be well-suited to your audio and video projects, as it is shared with a Creative Commons Attribution license.

Enjoy CIRCUS RING CONCERT!

album license: Creative Commons Attribution License

Jet Set Lifestyle Soundtrack

Montréal artist Tortue Super Sonic (TSS) brings you his new sonic wave. This wave is generally downtempo, as you will hear on his album, NEOGROTESQUE. You can expect some variations in the mix, such as guitars, synthetic strings, and some interesting experimentation. You will hear a couple outer space themes, an Arab flavored track, a song for robots, and even some luxurious easy listening.

Overall, the vibe of this album is the airy soundtrack to a sophisticated, international, jet set lifestyle. This could easily be library music for scenes of luxury by the pool, space travel, cloak and dagger action. Tortue Super Sonic (TSS) will excite your cinematic imagination.

Enjoy the entire album, NEOGROTESQUE, on the FMA.

album license: Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 France License

Quirky Genius of Logan Whitehurst

Logan Whitehurst began uploading his original songs to mp3.com back in 1997 and gained a strong online following for his music. His quirky songs were regularly played on Dr. Demento and often compared to the likes of They Might Be Giants. Whitehurst was a multi-instrumentalist and an accomplished graphic artist. Tragically, Logan passed away from a brain tumor at the age of 29.

Lee Rosevere of Happy Puppy Records worked with the Whitehurst family to provide the world a posthumous anthology of Logan's work. The 10 song collection, AN INTRODUCTION TO LOGAN WHITEHURST AND THE JR. SCIENCE CLUB, is now available on the Free Music Archive.

album license: Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.5 Canada License
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Shake That Little Foot

SHAKE THAT LITTLE FOOT is an album of Celtic and Appalachian classics for you, including traditional Scottish, mountain, and bluegrass favorites.

This mostly instrumental album was recorded in Liverpool, England in 1993 by a group who had yet to adopt a name. Eventually, they became "Shake That Little Foot." After getting their original tracks from the recording engineer, Mike Cooper, they released this album online.

The band notes that "Sally Ann" is a composite arrangement of three different traditional versions of this tune: a frailing banjo tune (the intro), a fiddle tune (the instrumental break), and a song. Guitarist Chris Erswell also notes:

"Don't miss the comic 'Flopped-Eared Mule'. There is also a rollicking rendition of 'Bill Cheathum' which will be sure to get your feet a-dancing. Oh, and there is a banjo version of 'Scotland the Brave' to a back beat like you've never heared it before."

album license: Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License
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Lee Rosevere - Instrumental

Canadian artist Lee Rosevere has been riding on the crest of the free digital music wave for about as long as the web has been able to provide music files. Rosevere is a veteran artist on many netlabels and even operates his own quality and low key free netlabel, Happy Puppy Records.

Lee works in radio, and much of his instrumental album BACKTIME was originally composed for use as radio themes, underscores, or for "backtime." The latter is a term used by in the radio industry for background music programmed to finish at a set time. The tracks are made up of beats, samples, and electronic and live instrumentation.

The entire album is available at the FMA for free download. Enjoy it as a body of work or use it in your own projects.

image: detail from cover of BACKTIME

album license: Attribution-NonCommercial License

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Matheatre

Move over, Tom Lehrer, with "The Elements," your periodic table classic. There is a new act on the scene. Their name is Matheatre. This time it isn't chemisty; it's mathematics. Marc Gutman and Sadie Bowman have written a touring Calculus musical, Calculus: The Musical!, and continued their clever work with C-Sections (available at the FMA) and Log, A Rhythm. A series of albums to encompass all of Pre-Calculus is in the works.

Get your nerd on now! Enjoy C-Sections in its entirety at the Free Music Archive!

album license: Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License
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Jane Siberry Shares Discography

Inimitable, complex, idiosyncratic, chanteuse Jane Siberry has chosen to make her discography available for free. Jane is offering 16 complete releases with booklets in both mp3 and aiff formats. Hopefully she will get a donation system going soon, because this is quite a large gift to offer the world.

If Jane Siberry is new to your ears, you are in for a treat. Her airy, delicate sound is singularly her own. Jane is beautiful. We can recommend our personal favorite albums as NO BORDERS HERE (1983) and SPECKLESS SKY (1985). Jane's self-titled album (1981) is similar to these two, and the only reason it is not a favorite is that we have not spent years with it as we have these two selections.

THE WALKING (1987) was critically acclaimed. You can disappear into its soundscapes. BOUND BY THE BEAUTY (1989) is a more pop, radio ready release with some catchy numbers. WHEN I WAS A BOY (1993) was co-produced by Brian Eno and Michael Brook and is considered Siberry's most eclectic work yet. Great ambient realms are created in that one.

Next came MARIA (1995) in which Jane performs with a jazz ensemble. Warm piano, bold brass, soft, then powerful. TEENAGER (1996) was Jane's first release on her own label. In this one, you can hear her freedom to do just as she pleases. She even revisits her very first songs. A DAY IN THE LIFE (1997) is an interesting sound collage wherein you actually follow Jane through a day.

NEW YORK TRILOGY (1999) is composed of three albums of material from three nights in 1996 at the Bottom Line nightclub in New York City. The last of which is songs for the Christmas season. In fact, much of Jane Siberry's more recent material reflects her faith. HUSH (2000) is made up of traditional American and Celtic selections, like "O' Shenandoah," "Old Man River," and "Streets of Laredo." SHUSHAN THE PALACE: HYMNS OF EARTH (2003) is a religious release of Christian hymns with an Early Music feeling.

After that nonsecular album, Jane Siberry gave away her possessions and changed her identity to Issa. She released DRAGON DREAMS and WITH WHAT SHALL I KEEP WARM? as Issa, as well as a third unreleased album. Among other themes, these address living with simplicity and character in nature. They flow like poetry.

Learn more about Jane at AllMusic.com and Wikipedia. Read about what she is up to now and why she has given you her music for free in recent articles at the Times Online, New York Times, and The Globe and Mail (photos).

For such an accomplished artist to give her work to the world in this way is a selfless gift. Thank you, Jane Siberry, you lovely woman.

DISCOGRAPHY

01. Jane Siberry (1981)
02. No Borders Here (1983)
03. Speckless Sky (1985)
04. The Walking (1987)
05. Bound by the Beauty (1989)
06. When I Was a Boy (1993)
07. Maria (1995)
08. Teenager (1996)
09. Day in the Life (1997)
10. New York Trilogy (1999)
New York Trilogy, 1 Tree, Music for Films and Forests
New York Trilogy, 2 Lips, Music for Saying It
New York Trilogy, 3 Child, Music for Christmas
11. Hush (2000)
12. Shushan the Palace, Hymns of Earth (2003)
13. Dragon Dreams (2008)
14. With What Shall I Keep Warm (2009)

Warm Orange

Australian label Patterns Community Sound Centre may not have a website any longer, but they have left a legacy through their recordings. This debut EP by Lagos Disco Machine is testimony. With thumb pianos, effects, and found sounds, the WARM ORANGE EP entertains your ears and brain with organic and electronic sound layers. Lagos Disco Machine is a misleading name, as only one selection is a dance track. In face, track three, "Lord Pear," sounds more like a tribal field recording. For clocking in at about 20 minutes, this EP takes your ears all over the place and back again. Enjoy it here at the FMA.

album license: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (aka Music Sharing) License

Walking On Eggshells

So good! This is a stimulating 24 minute documentary in which artists from writers to musicians to painters discuss modern culture and "appropriation, creative influence, re-use and intellectual property in the remix age." (Jonathon Letham talking about culture references in Bugs Bunny cartoons will hit home with several generations.) The artists have fascinating points of view.

The filmmakers Jacob Albert, Ryan Beauchamp, and Brendan Schlagel created this film as their final project for the seminar "Intellectual Property in the Digital Age" at Yale University.

Available on YouTube in 3 parts. All worthwhile.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3

Arrr, Pirate Songs, Matey!

Arrrr! Music makers of all ages are invited to make ocean or pirate songs for the upcoming PIRATE POP recording. If your song is popular with our listening team, your song will appear on the album. We look forward to hearing your entry, matey!

The deadline for submissions is June 15, 2010. Click here for details.

Good luck to all who participate in this contest! Thank you for sharing your work for kids!

detail of illustration "Pirates Vs. Ninjas" by Marcus Hadlock
[licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.]