List of websites with libre sounds and music

[Wuzzy]

Here are 2 lists of websites that either contain exclusively libre sounds and music, or they contain a large amount of such libre files:

Sound effects:

• https://github.com/saniv/free-game-sfx
• http://freesound.org/
• https://annotator.freesound.org/ (=freesound.org, but more searchable)
• http://opengameart.org/
• https://gamesounds.xyz/

Music:

• https://incompetech.com/
• https://freemusicarchive.org/

Disclaimer: Some of these websites (those with the exclamation mark icon) have some files that are not libre, among all the libre files. But you can filter them out in the search function, to filter out the bad licenses. Use the filter. So make sure to understand the website. I included thsese websites because they still offer a huge wealth of libre files, it's just that not 100% of their files are libre.

I hope I could help you!

[Lyberta]

Deleted.

[smcameron]

Music

* archive.org -- This can be difficult to search though. You need to enter for example "/metadata/licenseurl:http*by-sa*" in the search box to search by license, as described here: http://www.cs.bham.ac.uk/research/proje ... index.html Here is an example search for "ambient" with license by-sa: https://archive.org/search.php?query=am ... 2Aby-sa%2A

* musopen.org -- has sheet music and recordings of classical music with reasonable licenses. They have even hired some orchestras to perform some pieces specifically in order to make public domain recordings. Quality varies. Some recordings are quite good, and some recordings are performed by e.g. high school orchestras and are less than perfect. The site seems to have become slightly more annoying than it was when it first started. I haven't used it in a while. I have noticed if you put classical pieces into youtube videos -- even when the license is perfectly fine with that -- youtube will mistake it for a copyrighted recording of the same piece. So while in theory it should work fine, in reality it's often more of a pain in the ass than it's worth.

Sci Fi UI Sound Effects

How to Merzbow 101 on Modulargrid (WARNING this one starts making sound as soon as you click the link). This one is a bit strange. It's a web based simulation of a modular synth with a particular patch. Start recording and twiddle the 4 big knobs on the upper left for awhile, then go back with audacity and cherry pick UI sounds out of the recording. Gets some nice FM modulation sounds. Have some patience and keep twiddling the knobs, it might take a little while to find the sweet spots.

[Wuzzy]

Yes, freesound.org has a lot of non-free files. But still a lot of files are libre. That's why I put the disclaimer at the bottom. If you act responsibibly, it's still an incredibly useful resource.
Freesound.org has a filter feature to filter out the bad licenses. So this website is still invaluable and I have it used extensively for game/mod development (only the libre sounds, of course!). For my own games/mods I also used OpenGameArt.org frequently, but it seems to be not as large, but this might be just my own perception. I even uploaded a few sounds here a very very very long time ago.
But I have edited my post a bit to make it more visible.

Remember it's always your own responsibility to check licensing, don't blame me when things go wrong.

[Wuzzy]

Oh crap. I was just forced to remove soundimage.org from the list. It looked like they were using CC BY 3.0 but then I read the actual license text and noticed they actually add a very sneaky teeny-tiny modification to the license text.

2. Restrictions

The use of the Licensed Material in media that violates Youtube community guidelines is prohibited.

This license applies to all files … Sigh. Such a shame. It would have been such a wonderful site. The YouTube community guidelines are pretty terrible, adding this to your license is horrifying (even from a non FOSS-zealot point of view), plus, they are ever changing, making a legal use very difficult. From what I read, apparently the author added this restriction because they don't want their work to appear in “obscene” material … >_>
I always hate it when people add little pointless restrictions in their licenses that serve absolutely nobody (not even themselves). >:-(

Whatever. Thankfully, I never used any of these files from this site.

[fluffrabbit]

I don't understand why the site would have any mention of YouTube. Are they affiliated in some way?

[anon666]

http://dig.ccmixter.org

google: ambient "some rights reserved" site:bandcamp.com
google: ambient "/by-sa/" site:bandcamp.com
google: ambient "cc-by" site:bandcamp.com

https://archive.org/search.php?query=title%3A(piano)+AND+licenseurl%3A(http*by-sa*)
archive.org: title:(piano) AND
(licenseurl:(http*by-sa*) OR (licenseurl:(http*by*) AND NOT
licenseurl:(http*by-*)) OR licenseurl:http*publicdomain*)
https://soundcloud.com/search/sounds?q= ... mmercially

back then its worked not sure how its now
there's also a large jamendo collection with sometimes nice music with free licenses

[anon666]

CC0
https://modarchive.org/index.php?reques ... &query=cc0
public domain
https://modarchive.org/index.php?reques ... blicdomain
CC BY
https://modarchive.org/index.php?reques ... e&query=by
CC BY-SA
https://modarchive.org/index.php?reques ... uery=by-sa

[drummyfish]

I am surprised no one mentioned the greatest repository of exclusively libre files and one of the best websites ever, Wikimedia Commons. It has all types of files, including music and sounds in waveform and MIDI formats.

e.g. CC0 MIDI files at Wikimedia Commons

Also on LibriVox you can find a few sung songs that are all CC0, though I'm not sure how usable they're in games. E.g. Silent Night at LibriVox.

[freemedia2018]

I am surprised no one mentioned the greatest repository of exclusively libre files and one of the best websites ever, Wikimedia Commons. It has all types of files, including music and sounds in waveform and MIDI formats.

its a great resource, but the lack of being game-oriented seems like a significant drawback in this context.

it would be interesting to find or make a game that made use of stuff from there.

[Julius]

https://starfrosch.com/
Seems like a cool place for mostly electronic music.