Online Scores and Sheet Music
Digital sheet music collections are good places to look for nineteenth and early twentieth century songs. The collections listed below are a starting point for finding online scores.
Online Resources for Music Scholars: Digital Scores includes links to many other sites. Look for words like Sheet Music, Songs, or Singing in the title or description.
- Sheet Music Consortium200,000+ pieces of sheet music from the collections of 22 institutions. Sign up for a free account to make your own private or shared portfolios of sheet music from the site.
- Music for the Nation: American Sheet Music, ca. 1870 to 1885Over 47,000 pieces of sheet music registered for copyright at the Library of Congress between 1870 and 1885.
- Music for the Nation: American Sheet Music, ca. 1820 to 1860Over 15,000 pieces of sheet music registered for copyright at the Library of Congress between 1820 and 1860.
- Library of Congress: Historic Sheet Music Collection, 1800-19229000 pieces of music - the majority from 1850-1920 - including both classical and popular songs.
- IMSLPIMSLP (The International Music Score Library Project) holds thousands of digitized scores from collections around the world. The site is governed by Canadian copyright law; not all available scores are in the public domain in the United States. Use Harvard's subscription to skip wait times for downloads.