>Because of the way copyright laws are set up, the person who worked >out those beautiful chords to all those Berlin tunes doesn't get a >penny of royalties, as only lyrics and melodies are copyrightable. >Yet, IMHO, those songs might not have been the successes that they >were without the contribution of the assistant, so wouldn't they be >due a bit of spare change? > >Christopher
It is not true that "only lyrics and melodies are copyrightable," nor was this true in Berlin's day. A chord in and of itself is indeed not copyrightable, nor is a chord progression that is not part of a piece. The same is true of any other aspect of music held in isolation. A tone row, for example, is not copyrightable (or rather, any copyright in it does not extend to music created using that row)--but a melody comprised of those same 12 notes is. If I write a piece of music, then my copyright in that piece applies to all aspects of it, and if somebody creates a new melody to use with my original chords, they must obtain permission before making use of the combination. Consider a jazz performance of a tin-pan-alley "standard." The original melody may never be heard at all, but if (as would normally be the case) I call the thing by its original title, and use the original chord progression, it counts as a performance of the original song, and a royalty is collected by ASCAP or BMI. Irving Berlin's amanuensis was doing what would now be called "work made for hire." Regulation of this is much stricter now than it was then, but the basic principle is the same: If I hire someone to compose music for me, then I own the resulting music. Be all which as it may, however, I do not think, based on what I have read, that Berlin needed anybody to compose chords for him. He played everything on his famous transposing keyboard, and the amanuensis simply took down what was played. Doubtless he couldn't *name* many of the chords, or describe their function, but that's no reason at all why he couldn't play them. And why would F# major be an advantage to play in if one were only picking out tunes? If you're not playing chords, then it would make more sense to stick to just the white keys, rather than the black ones. -- Andrew Stiller Kallisti Music Press http://www.kallistimusic.com _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
