Freesounds : Digital Audio Tools, Sound Sample Collections, Open Music Resources

Open Music Search Tools 

Find free and legal media you can share and remix

Thousands of musicians, sound designers, and software developers are making their creative works available online for others to share openly and freely. Organizations like Creative Commons provide the legal framework for creators to mark their works with the kind of flexible freedoms they want it to carry - "Some Rights Reserved" as opposed to "All Rights Reserved".

This type of free culture movement is known as open music because it applies the concept of open source computer software to music. The social web has made it possible for everyone to participate in the creation, distribution and promotion of Open Music through remixing, podcasting and web-mashups using widgets. Now you can easily find free, legal, pre-cleared media and Open Source resources using these powerful new search tools.

Open Music Search

This Google Custom Search Engine (CSE) penetrates straight to the heart of the Open Music Ecosystem. Indexing more than 180 hand-picked resources with filtering for different media pools. Use it to find free music, sound samples, open source software, people, and other copyleft media services.

Creative Commons Search

Provides multiple engines for searching main Open Media hubs with the option to filter searches by desired source, media type, and Creative Commons license. Use it to find free music, videos, images, and other media.

Copyleft Media Links 

Sources of legal, pre-cleared music

Dave's FeedRaider - Copyleft Music

A hub of single-page aggregators for fast browsing of audio, music and news feeds including: CC music, MP3 blogs, netlabels, Open Media, P2P, podcasts, social media, and lots more.

Open Media Directory

A free resource for finding legal, podsafe music and video. Part of the Ourmedia Learning Center this is an essential bookmark for all music and video enthusiasts. The hand picked resources are designed to help artists, podcasters, bands, DJs, remixers, music bloggers and creators of video content working with copyleft - Creative Commons - royalty-free licenses.

Creative Commons Licensed Sounds 

CC licensed media resources

ccMixter Samples

This is the sample section of the ccMixter remix community. All samples are licensed under the Creative Commons family of license agreements. The special sample browser makes it easy to locate samples using a combination of tag search and BPM specification. ccMixter has teamed up with other sample-based web sites (Freesound)and open music net labels to provide collaboarative tools for assisting remixers. There are also sample packs compiled by top community remixers highlighting the best samples and projects.

Curvedspace Drum Samples Volume 1

A 20 meg sample archive of live acoustic Tama Swingstar drum loops and single shot recordings released under a CC license. Samples are 16 bit AIFF files, sampled at 44.1 kHz. Recorded using Logic Audio 6.3.1 on a Power Mac G4 400 with Nady drum mics on toms, AKG overheads, Shure SM57 on snare.

Flashzen

Has around fifty zen inspired looped musical compositions ranging from 10 seconds to 3:30 minutes. The Mp3 format downloads are released under a CC license.

Fonogeno Electronic Music Productions

A small collection of mp3 samples under a CC license including: Atmospheres, Sound FX, Beats, Riffs, Bass.

Freesound

A collaborative database of sound samples, loops and effects. Users can up and download audio to and from the database under the Creative Commons Sampling Plus License. The site provides a way for sound designers and artists to legally share and track the evolution of their creations including ccMixter collaborations. The database is for sound samples and loops only - the building blocks of compositions, field recordings and generated sounds - not full songs. Membership to the Freesound community is free.

iBeat

Provides a free database of high quality 16bit 44kHz wave files under Creative Commons. Download musicloops and sessionloops including beats, breaks, and hundreds of single sounds ranging from 3 - 30 seconds in length. Free registration gives access to unlimited downloads and more features.

G Essence Sounds

Offers samples from minimalist electronic music tracks for remixing. The sounds are released under a Creative Commons Sampling Plus license. Related electronic music projects include -N netlabel and podcast, plus the excellent ACOWO blog and podcast for showcasing netlabel releases.

G-Town Church Sampling Project

A set of CC-licensed music samples including: anvil, snare, wood stick, hihat, brushplate, bongos, piano, organ, mandolin, glockenspiel, flute, and many other instruments. Recorded by music producer Tobias Marberger in his local church in Grebbestad, Sweden. Available to download via Bittorent at Legaltorrents.com. There's a choice of two separate torrents, with either the original .WAV files with separate EXS24 soft sampler patches, or as .GIG Gigastudio-formatted versions.

Ljudo

A searchable database of over 1200 sound effects and instrument samples in mp3 format under a CC license. Provides multiple language search options.

OLPC - Sound Samples

Over 10GB of Free Samples - Sound Effects, Loops, Grooves, Drums, Voices and Instruments - for The Children of the World. This huge and continuously expanding collection of new and original samples have been donated to Dr. Richard Boulanger @ cSounds.com specifically to support the OLPC developers, students and XO users. They are free and will be available under a CC-BY license for downloading and use in your music and activities. Each of the 6500+ samples is 16-bit, WAV, Mono, normalized to -3dB, and provided at 3 sample rates - 44.1K, 22.5K and 16K.

SoundSource

SoundSource is a free Sound Effects, Noise and Sample archive designed to be useful for radio and Radioplay producers as well as for artists. The service allows users to share files under CC licenses and supports German and English languages. When last checked in early 2007, only a handfull of sounds had been uploaded.

SoundTransit

A collaborative, online community dedicated to field recording and phonography. It is home to a growing database of sound recordings made in various locations worldwide. Each recording is a sonic document of sounds found in a particular environment. SoundTransit lets you discover the sounds of various cultures by 'booking' a sonic journey between two locations including stopovers. The site then creates a composite MP3 file for you to play or download made from audio found in the SoundTransit database. The Search section, lets you search the database for specific sounds by member artists from many different places. Phonographers are encouraged to contribute recordings using the Creative Commons Attribution license which allows others to share and re-use the work.

Public Domain Sounds 

Sounds that are always free to share

Extreme Synth Weirdness Project

An open audio database of user created synth sounds and demos. The project is designed to show the hidden potential of a single synth, sound software or multi equipment setup. Anyone can email mp33 files or links demonstrating extreme use/mis-use of sound equipment. The media files are then made available online complete with documentation describing the equipment used and sound creation process. Submissions to the ESWP are considered in the public domain unless otherwise noted.

Public Domain Sounds | free sound library

A collection of shared sound recordings released into the public domain. Aims to develop an open library encompassing all types of sounds heard in the world around us.

Newgrounds Audio Portal

Audio artists make their MP3 music, samples and loops available to Flash movie creators. All works enter the "NG public domain", meaning anyone is welcome to use the material in their Flash creations, free of charge.

University of Iowa Electronic Music Studios

A collection of orchestral instrument samples created by Lawrence Fritts. All samples are in mono, 16 bit, 44.1 kHz, AIFF format apart from the Steinway piano which is a stereo recording. The samples may be used freely without any restriction.

Misc Sound Collections 

Other places you can find free sounds

Beasty Boys Acapella Download Page

Currently has downloadable audio of vocal performances in a range of BPMs. The acapellas are for your own personal use for creating remixes which can be shared in the Beastie Boys Remix Forum. New tracks are added every Friday.

DJSamples Free Samples and Loops

Provides a growing collection of user submitted samples in WAV and MP3 formats. The site requires free registration which is simple and quick, no need to confirm account via email before logging on. The free samples are for entertainment purposes only. You can purchase royalty-free samplepacks that allow you to use the samples as many times as you like in any commercial or non-commercial project. Some restrictions apply. Consult the 'licensing agreement' for more information.

efiddler

Gives you online access to real violin tracks and fiddle tracks for your recording projects. There are over 100 violin loops grouped into style categories including; Electric, Classical, Celtic, Country, and Gypsy.

Flashkit Loops

A Flash developers community with a selection of royalty-free audio loops and sound effects particularly suitable for use in multimedia projects. The site provides a selection of freeware, linkware and shareware audio files in a range of categories. All sounds can be previewed and usually have a brief description. Read the guidelines for information about copyright and usage restrictions.

Freeloops

Provides a free download section for samples in a range of musical styles and instrument types. All loops are original and may be used for music production only, in accordance with the licensing agreement. Full sample packs are also available for purchase.

HammerSound SoundFonts

A web-site focusing on computer music and sound creation using SoundFont compatible soundcards like the SoundBlaster Live!, the AWE-range of soundcards, and several others. The SoundFont Library is a database containing free SoundFonts submitted by people from all over the world. By uploading soundfonts users give site creator Thomas Hammer the permission to distribute the soundfonts for free on the net.

iCompositions Loops

Shared samples and loops from members of the iCompositions community. The downloads display a license declaration of how they may be used such as "commercial derivatives allowed".

Looperman

Offers free loops of various instruments including acoustic, electronic and vocals. All loops are saved as zip files and sounds can be previewed before downloading. Check the FAQ page for clarification of how you may use them. There are also sections for tutorials and related links.

Naturalstudio

Douglas Whates has created drum and piano samples in WAV, SoundFont, Gigastudio and Battery versions. The zipped sample packs have MP3 demos so you can preview the sounds before downloading. There's also a jazz guitar SoundFont and some bank presets you can use with the sample packs including Akai S5/6K multi, EXS-24, Halion, Hydrogen, Kontakt, Muzys etc.

Ontology SampleSwap

A free community for electronic musicians to share their original sounds and music. Samples and loops are archived in categories for easy retrieval and members can exchange ideas and tips in the forums.

SampleNet

A searchable database of copyright free sound samples and loops in mp3 format. Part of the SonicState.com musician's resource.

The Philharmonic Sound Exchange

Thousands of free, downloadable sound samples specially recorded by Philharmonia Orchestra players. From piccolo to double bass there are single notes, phrases and whole orchestra samples to choose from. You can use the samples to create any kind of musical composition, you can even share them with other people, but you cannot sell them. In other words, you have the right to use them, but they are not for re-sale.

Versionist Music Library

Versionist Riddim Community members share samples for Reggae, Dub and Hip Hop styles. There are zipped sample packs in categories for Bass, Drum, Guitar, Horn, Misc, Organ. Permission for use as granted by original creators.

Wikimedia Commons - Sound

A central repository for freely licensed media. Everyone is allowed to copy, use and modify any files freely as long the source and the authors are credited and as long as copies/improvements are released under the same freedom to others. The license conditions of each individual media file can be found on their description pages.

Ziggus Guitar Loops

Offers a small collection of royalty-free guitar loops. Categories include Clean, Effected, Metal, Rock and Loops.zip. Contains chord arpeggios, riffs, phrases etc .wav, .mp3, and .ogg formats.

Free Software Catalogs 

Online resources for all kinds of software

Don't Crack

A catalog of audio software for Mac and PC with sections for free or commercial programs, plugins and widgets.

NGO-In-A-Box Audio Video Edition

A collection of specially selected free and open source Software (FOSS) tools, documentation and tutorials. A useful hub for audio and video resources with further links to free culture projects and resources.

Ohloh

A searchable index of open source projects for all types of applications including audio and music software. The tagging system makes it very easy to navigate and locate related projects.

Open Source Alternative - Find Open Source Alternatives to commercial software

osalt.com helps recommend a open source software alternative or replacement for commercial products and even shareware. Remember that open source software is also a freeware alternative.

OStatic

OStatic's goal is to increase the adoption of Open Source Software by helping users find viable projects and applications that fulfill specific needs, evaluate them against available alternatives and collaborate with their network of trusted peers. Use the search function to find audio and music projects.

Soundalot Audio Freeware

A collection of free audio tools and other music production software.

SourceForge.net Sound/Audio Projects

The largest repository of Open Source applications on the Internet with thousands of free sound related projects sorted by category.

Wakoopa - Discover software & games

A service that allows you to track ypur apps, discover new software, share what you use and get updated by friends. Provides a search tool with options to narrow by platform and software type.

Wikipedia Free Audio Software

Contents includes: Technologies, Platforms, Recording and editing, Trackers, Programming languages, Modular systems, Streaming, Radio broadcasting, Softsynths, Audio analysis, Others, External links.

Free DJ Applications 

Virtual decks and DJ mixing

DeKstasy

A DJ application for Mac OS X. It provides automatic beat-finding and seamless beat-locked playback of up to four tracks simultaneously, contains a built-in mixer, and is so rock-solid you won't believe it's free software. Encode and import tracks from Audio CDs or records, or simply import pre-existing MP3's. Analyze a file's BPM and create an exact beat signature for TRUE beat matching. Play tracks on four virtual decks, all at once and all perfectly synced up. Automatically beat match to any external audio signal, makes tag-teaming a breeze!

Easily loop sections of playing tracks, all live and in real time. Carry around hours and hours worth of music, all on your laptop; a 20GB drive will give you over 200 hours of music encoded at high quality. Visually set up the mix without worrying about the synchronization of the tracks, allowing you to stay focused on the mixer and not on the decks. Organize all your tracks into virtual Crates and Albums.

Djay for Mac OS X

Control and mix audio with two virtual, interactive turntables. Runs natively on both Intel and PowerPC processors. Supports all common file formats, such as mp3, aiff, wav, aac, caf. You can record and transmit the audio in real-time over the Bonjour network to other connected djays.

Mixxx

Designed for DJ'ing for both professional and semi-professional users. It is free, and runs on all major desktop operating systems. There are a number of key features to help the DJ in the live mix: Beat estimation, parallel visual displays, supports MIDI and standard input devices such as Joysticks and mice. Mixxx reads most popular sound formats, including MP3, Ogg Vorbis, Wave and Aiff. Integration with Prokyon3, a music management application, is now possible for efficient access to your music library.

Free Sound Applications 

Open Source, Freeware and Shareware

Ardour

Ardour is an open source digital audio workstation with packages available for MacOSX, including source code for Linux and MacOSX. It allows you to to record, edit, and mix multi-track audio, produce your own CD's and mix video soundtracks. Although Ardour is similar to Logic, ProTools, Nuendo, Cubase SX, Digital Performer, Samplitude, Sequoia, Sonar etc, it is not a sound file editor, a MIDI sequencer (though that is planned) or a loop-based music system. Ardour is capable of: multichannel input recording, non-linear, non-destructive region based editing with unlimited undo/redo, full automation support, advanced mixing, plugin support, control from hardware control surfaces, timecode sync.

Audacity

A free, easy-to-use audio editor and recorder for Windows, Mac OS X, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems. You can use Audacity to:

+Record live audio.
+Convert tapes and records into digital recordings or CDs.
+Edit Ogg Vorbis, MP3, and WAV sound files.
+Cut, copy, splice, and mix sounds together.
+Change the speed or pitch of a recording.

Audiofile Engineering - Loop Editor

A free simple, audio loop editor for Mac OS X. Designed in Cocoa from the ground up, Loop Editor proudly takes advantage of Quartz, CoreAudio, and other solid OS X interface features.

Loop Editor supports all audio file formats that support loop markers, including every type of looping available for any given format. Loop Editor is one of the only applications available that manages multiple loop makers (within files that support multiple loops).

dyne:bolic

A free multimedia studio that boots from CD. No need to install anything, fully portable, designed to run on slower systems. Dyne:bolic recognizes your hardware devices (sound, video, firewire, and USB) and offers a vast range of software for multimedia production, audio editing (Audacity and ReZound), streaming, 3D modeling, photo, peer-to-peer filesharing, web browsing and publishing, word processing, email, encryption, and networking. It also includes games and a world navigator.

Gungirl Sequencer

AN easy to use Audiosequencer. It includes a simple Filemanager and uses Drag & Drop to arrange Audiosamples. 32-bit MS Windows (NT/2000/XP), All 32-bit MS Windows (95/98/NT/2000/XP), All POSIX (Linux/BSD/UNIX-like OSes), Linux, OS X, Win2K, WinXP

Hammerhead Rhythm Station

A simple TR-909-like drum computer program aiming at the dance-scene. You can use it to create perfect Techno loops, Jungle patterns or House beats, but it's also suitable for Hip Hop, Triphop, Rap, Industrial and almost any other music you can think of. HammerHead features six separate channels, 29 built-in drum sounds, six complete breakbeats and the possibility to import six samples of your own. You can save your patterns to completely noise-free CD-quality wave files to use them with your sampler, tracker or sequencer program.

HarddiskOgg

A real-time hardisk recorder in Ogg Vorbis that takes a wave input stream from any Windows 95/98/2000/XP compatible sampling device (including analog microphone input and line in) and converts it to an Ogg Vorbis/Wave/Monkey's Audio/MP3 (optional) stream. Capable of recording 18 hours of audio per GB.

HighLife: From discoDSP - VST plugins for Windows

Freeware sampler with VSTi sampling, sample editor, five built in effects, flexible modulation, parameter morphing, highest offline resampling quality using 512 point SINC. HighLife is able to export your sampled VSTi to WAV or SFZ formats.

Kristal Audio Engine

A powerful multi-track recorder, audio sequencer and mixer - ideal for anyone wanting to get started with recording, mixing and mastering digital audio. It is designed as a modular system. The main application provides a mixing console, while the audio sequencer, live audio input and so on are loaded as separate Plug-Ins. Windows XP or 2000 (Win98/ME requires latest Internet Explorer 6.0, WinNT is not supported)

LUNA - MUTOOLS.com

A free program designed to compose and perform music with audio/MIDI capability and support for up to four basic VST plug-ins, there is an upgrade path priced @ 29 Euros (Limited Offer). There is also CMusic, a special version of LUNA that comes for free with each issue of Computer Music magazine.

LUNA uses similar interface concepts and design elements to other main software packages but is less complex and easier to learn. Before you try it visit the support forums to get a feel for other users' experiences.

Mixere

A free, open-source application for mixing audio files. It runs on Windows NT/2000/XP, and supports WAV, AIFF, MP3, Ogg Vorbis, Flac, and Mod audio files. Mixere is optimized for live performance, and especially for creating live sound collage. Conceptually, it's like a rack full of CD players connected to an automated mixer. Mixere's features include dynamic looping of audio, auto-triggering of audio, fully automated sliders, "soft" (gradual) mute/solo operations, crossfading between documents, and unlimited undo.

A Mixere document consists of a number of tracks, each containing a single audio file. Any number of tracks can play simultaneously, subject only to the limits of Windows and sound card performance. Audio is streamed directly from disk, so there's no limit on audio file size, and no waiting for audio to be loaded into memory. Mixere's interface is similar to a spreadsheet. The rows are tracks, and the columns are properties which can be adjusted for each track: name, transport (play/pause/stop/loop), mute/solo, volume, pan, pitch (+/- one octave), and audio position.

OpenSebJ

A free real time audio sample mixer that runs on Microsoft Windows. The source code for OpenSebJ is released under the GNU General Public License.

Features include:
+Supports loading of 255 Audio samples (wave format), which can be played in real time
+Sample properties such as, Volume, Pan and Frequency can be adjusted individually for each sample (even during mid play)
+A composition tool is provided, presented in a familiar multi-track sequencer environment. Looping compositions are also supported.
+Samples can be linked to keys on the keyboard and trigged in real time when a key press occurs.
+Each sample can also have the play cursor position adjusted while the sample is playing, to provide a virtual needle to be moved.
+Stream to disk recording, allows all audio played from OpenSebJ to be saved.
+Pitch shifter roll, allows an order to be setup, so that each time a sample is played the next pitch shift in the sequence is undertaken before the sample is played. i.e. set up a sample to key '1', then setup a pitch shift sequence, high,mid,low,higher etc (using frequency values which are transposed to on screen 'ranges' to allow easier utilisation).

Psycle Modular Music Creation Studio

Psycle is a Music tracker (like FastTracker 2 or Impulse Tracker) combined with plugin modularity. It supports its own plugin API, the VST2 plugin standard (VST Host), and a tracker style sampler playback. (Windows, Linux)

REAPER

Audio Recording and Editing for Windows, similar to Audacity. REAPER versions 0.xx are available as freeware. With release v1.0 the license will change to shareware, but you can freely use REAPER versions 0.1-0.99 for free. The latest version is uncrippled unexpiring shareware.

Soundplant

Soundplant 26 turns the computer keyboard into a customizable sound triggering device and realtime digital audio performance tool. It can assign wav & aif sounds of unlimited size (registered version also loads mp3 files) onto 72 keyboard keys via a drag-and-drop, point-and-click interface. It is used for live music creation, sound design, radio, presentations, theater, as a drum pad, as a DJ tool. Freeware for Windows and Mac by Marcel Blum.

Soundflower Free Audio Routing Utility for MAC OS X

Soundflower is a Mac OS X (10.2 and later) system extension that allows applications to pass audio to other applications. Soundflower presents itself as an audio device, allowing any audio application to send and receive audio with no other support needed(Open Source).

Traverso DAW

An Open Source Multitrack Audio Recording & Editing Suite that offers a complete solution from recording to CD Mastering. Features include: Clean and concise interface, Non-destructive editing, Virtually unlimited track count, Unlimited un/redo, Playback and Record in the file format of your choice, On the fly samplerate conversion, Multiple Driver Backends, Lockless realtime audio processing, CD TOC creation and integrated CD Burning. Cross platform, runs on Linux, Mac OS X and Windows.

Sound Support Sites 

Useful audio and music links

Big Audio Lists on DISS

Several unique lists with hundreds of links to useful sites for music production, DJ resources, sound software, reference guides & tutorials, open source audio, audio plugins, Flash players, web audio, and computer related tools.

Famous Sounds

A list of sounds (with mp3 examples) that have found "classic" status by their popularity and subsequent copying by others over the decades.

Patch Arena

An online community for sound designers and electronic musicians. Hosts the worlds largest collection of user created patches and skins for hardware and software synthesisers and effects. The patch database contains hundreds of banks for VST Plugins, DirectX Plugins, Audio Units Plugins, Creamware, Orion, Reason, and FL Studio instruments.

Synthbase Network

A free synthesizer patch database where members can can upload and download a variety of synthesizer patches.

KVR Audio

Audio Plugin News, Reviews and Community provides news and information about open standard audio plugins including Virtual Instruments, Virtual Effects, VST Plugins, Audio Units (AU), DirectX (DX), Universal Binary Compatibility -

Yahoo! Music Software Groups

Directory of groups relating to music including discussion and support groups for a number of audio software apps.

Social Media Aggregation 

Media Explorer - Internet Music & Technology Feeds

Launch the Media Explorer to access hundreds of music blogs, podcasts, streaming audio channels, technology news and other top media feeds. This is a powerful tool for playing and downloading audio files. You can also add the widget to your own pages.

Dave's FeedRaider - Social Web

Aggregated news feeds focusing on Social Media and Creative Networking. Use the menu to quickly jump between topics for audio, music and Internet technologies. Hold the mouse curser over the news titles to read the content.