Back in the day, WAY before records and 8-tracks, people used wax cylinders to record their music. Thanks to the magic of technology, the songs and sounds reordered on these have been digitized and are on the net for anyone to listen to and use. The UCSB library has uploaded 10K audio recordings so that they are there for the listening.
These recordings cover a vast selection of sound. Sure there is a ton of music from smooth jazz to lively fiddles. But there are also audio recordings of explorations and weird people doing weird things. Basically, it’s the YouTube of olden times
These selections are available to listen to or download. You can discover new music by genre or by instrument. There are literally hours of media waiting to be explored in a variety of languages and styles. You can even help the project by “adopting” a cylinder. There are still 2000 more cylinders that will be uploaded. If you’ve ever wondered what life sounded like in the early 1900s, check out this project.