Legal Alternatives

For members of the Harvard community, the library offers physical, audio and video collections:

Music

  • Naxos Music Library: Classical, world, and folk recordings from 375+ labels
  • Music Online: A family of audio and video collections: Classical Music Library; Jazz Music Library; Opera in Video; Dance in Video; American Song and African American Music; Smithsonian Global Sound; Contemporary World Music
  • DRAM: A collection focused on independent label American recordings
  • Naxos Jazz Library: Jazz, blues, R&B, rock, and spoken word from 150+ record labels
  • Naxos Video Library: Video of concerts and performances, documentaries, masterclasses, and recording sessions
  • Audio Drama: The L.A. Theatre Works Collection: Video and sound More info\
  • Met Opera On Demand: Video and sound More info

If we don’t have it, you can submit requests for CD/audio via Interlibrary loan.

Movies:

  • Kanopy is an on-demand streaming video service for Harvard University that offers thousands of titles on a broad range of subjects including anthropology, architecture, art, gender & race, environment & sustainability, health, law, media, politics and psychology/sociology.
  • Also, you can go to HOLLIS+ and just search on the word DVD you should get nearly 55,000+ hits.  Since Harvard’s large video collection is partially housed in the Harvard Depository, and there are video collections held by many different Harvard libraries, the only way to browse all the collections is through Hollis. [Example: Search for "DVD" in HOLLIS+, then refine the results under Resource Type to "Video/Film." You can also refine the search by subject (e.g., "Feature films"), language, holding library, etc.] Obviously, there's a lot there, just try searching DVD and a keyword such as "Alec Guinness" or “Star Wars” or "Kung Fu.”

If we don’t have it, you can submit requests for DVD/video via Interlibrary loan.

In addition, there are many legal online sources for copyrighted material such as music and movies.  The most up-to-date legal sources are maintained by industry associations such as the RIAA and MPAA.  The bullets below include legitimate online services with useful lists of movies, music and tv shows.  

If you know of additional legal sites we haven't listed, please contact us.  We'd love to hear from you.  

Last updated:  May 26, 2020