Free music downloads from Christchurch City Libraries

Wednesday 1 May 2013

Christchurch City Libraries adds another flagship service to its impressive range of Digital Libraries resources today (Wednesday 1 May) — Freegal Music, enabling library members to download and keep up to three songs a week from Sony Music’s catalogue.

Coinciding with the celebration of New Zealand Music Month — and its free performances found in libraries across Christchurch throughout May — the launch of Freegal Music allows Christchurch City Libraries to increase the size and diversity of its collection. Freegal Music, from digital content provider Library Ideas, offers members access to over three million songs from 10,000 music labels and 65 different countries. Featured downloads include tracks from One Direction’s Take Me Home and Justin Timberlake’s The 20/20 Experience as well as classics from Beethoven and Bach. Under the terms of the agreement, library members can legally download three Freegal Music tracks in MP3 format each week — at no direct cost — via the Christchurch City Libraries website.

Freegal Music is easy to use, compatible with most devices and full of great music from today’s top 40 to classical, says Carolyn Robertson, Unit Manager Libraries and Information. There’s no better time to launch this service than during our New Zealand Music Month celebrations — it’s further proof that Christchurch City Libraries deserves its reputation as the first port of call for many music fans.This is going to be incredibly popular with our customers, and will serve as a gateway to the rest of our digital offerings. Christchurch City Libraries are far from being just about books on shelves — members can access our massive online resource, The Source, from the comfort of home.

Once a member has their library card and PIN, they can enjoy for free all the online resources subscribed to by Christchurch City Libraries, including e-books and audiobooks, current newspapers from around the world and language learning systems. Sony Music has an incredibly expansive and popular catalogue and we are really excited to partner with them on this, a very important product for libraries, says Brian Downing, co-founder of Library Ideas. A library is a focal point of the community that requires many tools to excite people about library resources. More than anything, that is the reason for the service.

To begin using these services, or for more information, please visit christchurchcitylibraries.com