Research Guides: Music: Find Scores

Free Scores at IMSLP

Recently Added Scores on IMSLP

Free Scores at Sibley

Search Sibley for Free Scores

Recently Added Scores on Sibley

Free Digital Scores

Free Digital Scores in the Public Domain

Public domain refers to works that are free to use because they have either fallen out of copyright, were published before 1923, or have been made so by the copyright holder.

General

California Sheet Music Project (UC Berkeley)
A virtual library of some 2,000 pieces of sheet music published in California between 1852 and 1900, together with related materials such as a San Francisco publisher's catalog of 1872, programs, songsheets, advertisements, and photographs. Images of every printed page of sheet music have been scanned at 400 dpi, in color where indicated.
Digital Sheet Music Collection (University of South Carolina)
The University of South Carolina's Digital Sheet Music Collection contains over 10,000 pieces of public domain classical, popular, and sacred music from the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Digital Sheet Music Consortium
Vast reservoir of digitized sheet music in the public domain. Consortium members include UCLA, Indiana University, Johns Hopkins University, and the Library of Congress, among several others.
Historic American Sheet Music (Duke University Libraries)
Digital images for over 3,000 pieces from the collection, published in the United States between 1850 and 1920.
Petrucci Music Library (IMSLP)
With over 214,000 scores, the International Music Score Library Project (IMSLP) is the largest repository of digitized sheet music available online. The scores are downloaded as PDF files and are optimized for printing. Virtually every work in the standard repertoire is archived and presented in multiple editions, arrangements, and versions. Whether you want the two-piano transcription of a Brahms symphony or the original orchestral version, IMSLP is likely to have it. A modest number of contemporary compositions contributed to the public domain can also be found here. Note: this site adheres to Canadian copyright, which is generally shorter in length than U.S. copyright.
Sibley Music Library Collection (University of Rochester)
Includes free access to over 18,000 scores, and some books, in the public domain, many of which are unique to Sibley Music Library. Scores are downloaded as PDFs and optimized for printing.

Piano

Walter Cosand's Scores
Thousands of scanned piano scores mostly of obscure compositions in the public domain or otherwise in copyright limbo.

Choral

Choral Public Domain Library
A wiki-style portal to nearly 15,000 choral and vocal scores, all available in the public domain and optimized for printing.

Vocal

Bodleian Library Broadsides
The Bodleian Library has over 30,000 ballads in several major collections. The materials range from the 16th- to the 20th-Century. The Broadside Ballads project makes the digitized copies available to the research community.
Digitized Opera & Musical Theatre Scores
Nearly 100 opera and musical theater digitized scores. This collection features works by composers such as Victor Herbert, John Philip Sousa, and Gilbert & Sullivan.
Folk Song Index
An index to traditional folk songs of the world with an emphasis on English-language songs. Each entry includes the song title, first line of chorus, first line of verse, and a citation.

Center for Popular Music, Middle Tennessee State University
The Center for Popular Music is an archive and research center devoted to the study of American popular music from the pre-revolutionary era to the present.
Charles H. Templeton Sheet Music Collection
Unique collection at Mississippi State University, comprised of 22,000 pieces of sheet music, including popular tunes dating as far back as 1865.
Music for the Nation: American Sheet Music, 1870-1885
Library of Congress project that includes over 47,000 scanned sheet music from the turn of the century, concert programs and ephemera. Included are popular songs, piano music, sacred and secular choral music, solo instrumental music, method books and instructional materials, and music for band and orchestra.

Digital Collections of Composers' Works

Chopin

Chopin Early Editions
Includes over 400 first and early printed editions of Chopin's works, maintained by University of Chicago Library's Special Collections Research Center.

Handel

Complete Works
This German digital library provides access to Handel's complete works, searchable by title, date, and keyword. Using this website will be easier if your browser can translate the page to English.

Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy's Works
This German digital library provides access to Mendelssohn's complete works, searchable by title, date, and keyword. Using this website will be easier if your browser can translate the page to English.

Mozart

Neue Mozart-Ausgabe
Mozart's musical compositions accessible to the public for personal study and for educational and classroom use. The digitized version offers the musical text and the critical commentaries of the entire Neue Mozart-Ausgabe, edited by the Internationale Stiftung Mozart in cooperation with the Mozart cities of Augsburg, Salzburg, and Vienna.

Schumann

Robert Schumann's Works
This German digital library provides access to Schumann's complete works, searchable by title, date, and keyword. Using this website will be easier if your browser can translate the page to English.

Search our Catalog for Scores

Do not include common grammatical conjunctions (and, or, in, of) in your search.

AND is assumed when searching a string of keywords together.

Use the truncation symbol * at the end of a term to search for all variant spellings. For example, pian* finds piano, pianist, pianism, etc. It is best to place the * as further to the end of a word as possible to retrieve narrower results.

Examples:

Variant spellings of a composer's last name

rachmanino*

(retrieves "rachmaninov" and "rachmaninoff")

Variant spellings of a title

sonat*

(retrieves "sonata", "sonatas", "sonate", "sonaten")

Combination search

Handel* opera*

(retrieves "Handel", "Handel's", "opera", "operas", "operatic")

Use quotation marks around keywords to retrieve results with the exact phrase. Searching 'piano sonata' without quotation marks will find items in the library that mention 'piano' and 'sonata' anywhere in the title or other part of the library record.

Find items with the exact phrase

"piano sonata"

Search by subject:

On the Advanced Search page, select "subjects" from a search box's dropdown menu.

Use keywords in the plural when searching for specific music forms or genres; e.g. "sonatas", not "sonata"

Sonatas

Symphonies

Concertos

Music -- 19th century -- History and criticism

Search subject headings by medium of performance. To do that, enter the plural form of the music genre (e.g. sonatas) and the instrument(s) without parentheses in a "subjects" search box.

Sonatas (Piano)

Choruses, Sacred (Women's voices)

Band music

Songs (High voice) with piano

Mississippi State University Library uses the Library of Congress Classification Scheme (LC) to organize its materials. LC call numbers contain letters and numbers. The letters indicate the general topic while the numbers provide more specific information about the material.

M = Music or Scores

ML = Music Literature and/or Music History

MT = Music Theory and Pedagogy

Here is an outline of the LC classification scheme for music scores. It will help you narrow your search to a particular topic when either browsing the shelves or searching our online catalog by call number range.

M 1-5000 MUSIC SCORES

M 1.A5-3.3 Collections of Musical Sources, including Monuments

M 3-3.3 Collected works of individual composers

M 5-1480 INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC

M 6-175.5 Solo instruments

M 177-990 Music for two or more solo instruments

M 180-298.5 Duets

M 300-386 Trios

M 400-486 Quartets

M 500-586 Quintets

M 600-686 Sextets

M 700-786 Septets

M 800-886 Octets

M 900-986 Nonets and larger combinations of purely chamber music

M 990 Chamber music for instruments of the 18th century and earlier

M 1000-1075 Orchestra

M 1001 Symphonies

M 1004 Overtures

M 1010-1011 Piano concertos

M 1100-1160 String orchestra

M 1200-1269 Band

M 1366 Jazz ensembles

M 1376-1420 Instrumental music for children

M 1473 Electronic music

M 1497-5000 VOCAL MUSIC

M 1497-1998 Secular vocal music

M 1500-1527.8 Dramatic music (including operas and musicals)

M 1500 Full scores

M 1503 Vocal scores with piano accompaniment

M 1611-1624.8 Songs for one (1) voice

M 1627-1853 National music

M 1990-1998 Secular music for children (useful for music education)

M 1999-2199 Sacred vocal music

M 2000-2007 Oratorios

M 2010-2017.6 Masses

M 2020-2036 Cantatas, choruses, etc.

M 2101-2114.8 Songs for one (1) voice

M 2115-2146 Hymnals

Library update: Recent database changes

Music