At 4:44 PM -0400 7/03/02, David H. Bailey wrote: >Christopher BJ Smith wrote: > >[snip] > >> >>One exception I heard about is the estate of Jerome Kern, who >>blocked an entire album of Maynard Ferguson's because he had >>included an arrangement of "Old Man River" that the family >>considered to be so utterly tasteless, that they were able to have >>the whole album run recalled on the premise that he hadn't asked >>for permission to arrange it. Almost nobody DOES ask permission, >>because I don't think permission has EVER been refused for a >>recording, but it was a "gotcha". >> > > >Actually, the U.S. copyright law reads that only on first recordings >does the copyright holder have the right to refuse to allow the >recording. On subsequent recordings all that is required is the >payment of the mandatory mechanical reproduction fee. Copyright >holders may NOT refuse permission, which is why nobody ever asks.
Hm. I knew that, but it always seemed like a corollary to "a prostitute cannot be considered to have been raped under the law, as she has already sold herself at least once." This (as applied to music, not women) is fine for commercial music, but shouldn't an artist have control over his/her art? > >The Kern estate may well have threatened a lawsuit over it, knowing >that they wouldn't win but hoping that the embarassment over such a >lawsuit and the airing in court of statements that the arrangement >was so tasteless was enough of a deterrent so the record label may >have pulled the record. Ah. My understanding of the law (as flawed as my understanding may be) is that if the recording had been of the ORIGINAL arrangement, the Kern estate would not have had a leg to stand on, which is why they resorted to the "didn't obtain permission to arrange" argument. And my understanding of the case is that they obtained a judge's order to recall the albums, not simply threatened to. _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mail.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
