Guides: Music: Find Recordings

Finding Audio Recordings

Streaming Audio and Video Databases
Milner Catalog

Naxos Music Library
Naxos Music Library is the library's most comprehensive streaming audio database. NML has nearly 125,000 albums and almost 1.9 million tracks of primarily classical music. Includes labels like Deutsche Grammophon and Sony Classical. You can create your own playlists or use NML's free app on your mobile device -- just sign up for an account.
Berliner Philharmoniker's Digital Concert Hall
Streaming video database of Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra concerts (some live-streaming), artist interviews, and documentaries. Users are required to create a personal account by clicking on "Start Institutional Access" and filling out the required information. Limit of three simultaneous users.
Met Opera On Demand: Student Access
More than 500 full-length Met performances, including stunning HD videos from the Met's award-winning Live in HD series of movie theater transmissions, classic telecasts from the 1970s, '80s, and '90s, and hundreds of radio broadcasts dating back to 1935. Note: the current subscription allows 5 users at a time to access the database.
Classical Music in Video (Music Online)
Streaming video database of concert orchestral, chamber music, and choral ensembles as well as solo performances. Some video recordings go back to the 1950s. Footage includes interviews with Copland, Reich, Cage, and others, performances by Ozawa, Solti, Bernstein. Great primary source for researching conductors and musicians. CMV also includes a fine series of masterclasses from the Masterclass Media Foundation. You can create your own playlists and edit video clips right in the browser.
Database of Recorded American Music (DRAM)
Scholarly database of streamed recordings that focus on American composers, performers, and ensembles. DRAM features CD-quality audio, liner notes, and labels such as New World Records, Composers Recordings, and Cedille Records.
Jazz Music Library (Music Online)
Offers streaming audio access to almost 60,000 jazz- and blues-centric albums. Listen to Coltrane, Fitzgerald, Ellington, Getz, Armstrong, Basie, Holiday, and hundreds more.
American Music (Music Online)
Music streaming database includes songs by and about American Indians, miners, immigrants, slaves, children, pioneers and cowboys. Includes multiple genres, performers, ensembles, and historic events like the Civil Rights, political campaigns, Prohibition, the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, anti-war protests and more.
Classical Music Library (Music Online)
Music streaming database of classical music. Search by title, instrument, performer, ensemble, time period, publisher, composer, and genre.
Contemporary World Music (Music Online)
Music streaming database includes genres such as reggae, worldbeat, neo-traditional, world fusion, Balkanic jazz, African film, Bollywood, Arab swing and jazz, and other genres such as Indian classical, fado, flamenco, klezmer, zydeco, gospel, gagaku, and more. Search by title, instrument, performer, ensemble, publisher, people, cultural groups, genre, and places.
Listening (Music Online)
Audiovisual collection includes music from multiple genres, time periods, and areas of the world. Search by title, instrument, performer, ensemble, publisher, people, cultural groups, genre, and places.
Popular Music Library (Music Online)
Music streaming database includes major genres like alternative, country, Christian, electronic, hip-hop, metal, punk, new age, R&B, reggae, rock, soundtracks and many more. Search by title, instrument, performer, ensemble, publisher, people, and genre.
Smithsonian Global Sound for Libraries (Music Online)
Music streaming database of world musical and aural traditions. Search by title, instrument, performer, ensemble, publisher, people, cultural groups, genre, and places. Developed in partnership with Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.

Finding Audio Files and CDs

You can find CDs and CD inserts by searching for CDs containing musicians, music types, or composers that you are researching. The process for finding audio files and CDs is very similar to the one for finding music scores. Start with the Milner Library catalog Advanced Search.

Change Everything to Library Catalog next to Search for.
Enter the composer's name in one box and select Author/Creator from the Keyword dropdown next to that box.
Enter the type of music or specific name of a piece of music in the next box and leave the dropdown next to it set for Keyword.
Change Material Type to Sound recordings. Choose Search.

The library offers many different audio formats including CDs and electronic audio files.

Recordings in Milner

Milner Library currently has around 10,000 CDs that you can check out. We also subscribe to streaming audio and video databases.