A while ago, we had a puja in our home and we were going to have a huge gathering of our close family. My mom wanted to give out music CDs to everyone as a mark of remembrance of the occasion. Dad reminded us that we can’t distribute songs without permission. That’s where I stepped in and said “No problem, that’s why we have the Podsafe Music Network.”

So, in a single night, I digged up some really pleasing instrumental music from the Podsafe Music Network as well as the Magnatune website.

Here are the 13 songs that were recorded (on the 150 CDs):

1. ‘Melody’ by Johnny Owl

2. ‘Loved Ones’ by Jazperience

3. ‘Cold Cloth and an Ice Pack’ by Derek K. Miller

4. ‘Serenity’ by Julie Melton

5. ‘My Friend’ by Denis Kitchen

6. ‘Lillian (A Portrait in Sound)’ by Jim Fidler

7. ‘On The First Day’ by Septology

8. Merrigan’s Reel by Jim Fidler

9. ‘Prelude and Fugue No. 1 in C Major, BWV 846: Fuga’ by Daniel Ben Pienaar

10. ‘Prelude and Fugue No. 2 in C Minor, BWV 847: Praledium’ by Daniel Ben Pienaar

11. ‘Adagio Sonata for Oboe and Basso Continuo in F (Besozzi)’ by Gonzalo X Ruiz

12. ‘Premier Recreation de Musique (Leclair)’ by Brook Street Band

13. ‘Triemer Six Cello Sonatas’ by Ensemble Mirable

(Note that I had downloaded the Jazperience songs from the old mp3.com and it was under a shareable license as well)

The latter half of these songs are from Magnatune – I was happy to see a good collection of songs that are not “mainstream pop and R&B”, as well as freely allowing the songs to be downloaded under a Creative Commons license. Their slogan “We are not evil” kicks a**.

Many relatives told my mom that the songs were good and they liked it. Here’s three cheers to this vision of music being the universal language of openness and culture.

Sidebar: The Amarok Live CD features the Amarok music player playing licensed songs from Magnatune, as soon as you put the CD in your computer.

Sidebar 2: Courtney Love’s article on “piracy” is very revealing about how the music industry works.