Discography of American Historical Recordings
Welcome to the Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR), a database of master recordings made by American record companies during the 78rpm era. It is part of the American Discography Project (ADP)—an initiative of the University of California, Santa Barbara that is edited by a team of researchers based at the UCSB Library.
To begin your research, enter names, titles, places, matrix or catalog numbers below, or click on the advanced browse or search buttons above.
What's Online and What's Coming
DAHR is an expansion of the Encyclopedic Discography of Victor Recordings (EDVR) incorporating previously published discographic data licensed from various publishers, folding them into the search and display framework of DAHR. Documentation of the activities of the Victor Talking Machine Company and RCA Victor derives primarily from consultation of publications of the companies and original documents held in the archives of Sony Music Entertainment in New York City. DAHR entries describing recordings made by Columbia Records, the Berliner Gramophone Co., OKeh Records, Zonophone Records, Leeds & Catlin Records, and Decca are based on authoritative published discographies, supplemented with new research, examination of recordings in the collections of the University of California Santa Barbara Library, and submissions from record collectors and archives.
DAHR currently includes information on 450,000 master recordings (matrixes) made by Victor, Columbia, OKeh, Berliner, Edison, Gennett, Plaza, ARC, Brunswick, Zonophone, and other record companies. Details on the editing progress on each company's masters is here.
The ADP is also a partner with the Library of Congress National Jukebox project and provides most of the cataloging data used in the Jukebox. As a result of this partnership, 11,000 recordings made by Victor and Columbia between 1900 and 1925 can be streamed online. An additional 85,000 masters from Victor, Columbia, Okeh, Edison, and other labels are also available via UCSB's streaming player or embedded YouTube links.
Explore the news sidebar to your right or follow our social media for updates on current editing and digitization projects.
Credits
The American Discography Project is funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the UCSB Library, and the William R. Moran Fund for Recorded Sound.
Electronic online database editions of The Columbia Master Book Discography, Berliner Gramophone Records: American Issues, 1892-1900, Discography of OKeh Records, 1918-1934, and The Decca Labels: A Discography, by arrangement with ABC-CLIO, LLC, Santa Barbara, CA. The American Zonophone Discography, and Leeds & Catlin Records by arrangement with Mainspring Press, Denver CO. All rights reserved. Full credits can be found here.
News
New Mainspring Press Discographies
Updated versions of nineteen eBook discographies published by Mainspring Press are now available from the UCSB Library on the Discography of American Historical Recordings (DAHR) website.
In addition to updates of sixteen previously available titles, now available are new titles not previously available as eBooks.
UCSB is pleased to continue our long-standing partnership with Mainspring Press to make their publications as widely available as possible.
Columbia Finnish Data Now Online
Data on recordings made by Columbia Records in Europe for Finland and for Finns in the United States is now documented in DAHR—over 1000 matrices recorded in Europe and about 500 matrices of Finnish-American performers recorded in the United States. Prior to 1930, Finnish-American artists were recorded by Columbia in the United States and sold both in the U.S. as well in Finland. Later, engineers from the British branch made recordings for the Finnish market.
The information on Finnish Columbia 78 rpm issues was compiled by Rainer Strömmer, the father of Finnish discography.
Public Domain Day 2026
Recordings published in 1925 entered the public domain on January 1, 2026. This includes over 2,800 recordings that have already been digitized by the UCSB Library for free public access.
Recordings entering the public domain in 2026 include jazz and blues, classical, recordnings for immigrant Americans and foreign markets, and electrical recordings by tango orchestras.
The public domain is an important part of the copyright law of the United States as expressed in the U.S. Constitution, which allows anyone to freely use creative works after the author’s limited monopoly expires.