Musopen Project Aims to Truly Liberate Already Free Music

Beethoven has been dead 183 years but thanks to DRM restrictions you can't legally share his copyright-free music from a CD you purchase at the local music store. An ambitious project by the team at Musopen wants to build an online library of free music that's already in the public domain so listeners can share and enjoy the music any way they choose.

Once they raise the necessary funds to pay an orchestra, they'll record symphonies from Beethoven, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, and Sibelius and share them with organizations like Wikipedia and archive.org. Musopen even plans to integrate the music files into netbooks via the One Laptop Per Child program.

Musopen is a 501(c)(3) tax-deductible nonprofit charity based in California. So far, it has raised nearly 10,400 -- just short of its $11,000 goal. Depending on the amount pledged, donors can receive early access to music online ahead of its public release or even get the chance to choose a piece of music to be recorded.

To get in on the project, head over to Kickstarter and pledge a couple of bucks. As we've mentioned before, Kickstarter is a great, risk-free way for people to donate money to a worthy cause. If the group reaches its goal, you're on the hook for your donation. If it doesn't, you won't be asked to pony up any cash at all. With the project a mere $700 away from it's goal, Musopen is likely to raise the funds to rent the orchestra they need to realize the dream of finally liberating music that's already been free for years.