>>Perhaps, but the original decision itself was musicological nonsensical....
There is NO perhaps in this matter. Had Hyperion simply given Dr. Sawkins a residual for each CD sold, as he asked at the start of the project, none of this would have gone to court. No bad decisions would have been issued.
And this wasn't an outlandish request: ASV Records had paid such royalities before. What's different in this circumstance, is that a court agreed with the editor, that he IS entitled and REQUIRED to be paid royalities. The issue isn't that Dr Sawkins is making himself to be the composer, he simply wants compensation for the intellectual property he created,
i.e. his performing edition. Without his contributions, the piece could not have been published or performed. It's that simple.
Dr. Sawkins has over 12,000 manhours invested in his editions. Hyperion owed $3,000.00 in royalities from CD sales), that nets him an hourly wage of about $4.00. When Hyperion was producing the CD, Dr. Sawkins states that he "repeatedly [offered] to negotiate a single sum in lieu of royalties, without any response." Instead, Hyperion stood by its principles, and recorded without Sawkin's approval. Hyperion was the one being unreasonable in this case, not Dr. Sawkins.
>>>The Hyperion decision is a Pyrrhic victory that will ultimately be a disaster for recording companies, performing groups and editors.
Maybe. Maybe not.
"Marc Perlman imagines that royalties for musicologists could make some projects more feasible. A company could tell a musicologist that in exchange for higher royalties, the musicologist will share more of the risk of the project. The upfront editing fee will be treated as an advance on royalties, not a payment. The risk is moved away from the company and to the musicologist. Reducing the upfront cost of the project could in this case lead to more projects being undertaken. Or perhaps it would leave the recording schedules pretty much the same, merely changing the ways in which musicologists receive what will still be a pittance."
I throughly disagree with your view that none of this has importance for an editor creating a modern PERFORMING edition; and then publishing it. There's no case that clearly illustrates the thorny nature of all this.
Kim Patrick Clow
Perhaps, but the original decision itself was musicological
nonsensical, however it may have conformed to the UK copyright law.
> And while I am fearful of what this will do to Hyperion, Dr. Sawkin's
> was hardly a Simon LeGreed in this matter. He was asking for modest
> compensation early on.
Er, he *was* compensated for his editing. That is the main thing
that, in my experience, most people miss -- they think Sawkins was
not paid for his edition. But he was already paid an editing fee. He
was asking for performance royalties, which generally go only to
performers, arrangers and composers. He basically argued that he was
a de facto co-composer with de Lalande, which is nonsensical, even if
the judge did agree with it.
> But this case illustrates exactly the thorny issues involved in
> preparing music editions of older music; and the editor's rights.
No, it involves nothing of the sort. The Sawkins case was *not* about
copyright in a printed edition. It was about performance/recording
royalties.
The musicological endeavor by definition is *not* compositional. The
editor of an edition is BY DEFINITION a slave to the original
composer's intentions. Sawkins was doing nothing more than trying to
recover the original intentions of the composer from sources that
imperfectly conveyed the original work.
Finding that this act is worthy of performance royalties will have
only one result: fewer new editions will be prepared for recordings,
or the editions will be prepared by performers instead of scholars.
Or, the recordings won't happen at all if a performance royalty must
be paid to the editor.
The Hyperion decision is a Pyrrhic victory that will ultimately be a
disaster for recording companies, performing groups and editors.
--
David W. Fenton http://dfenton.com
David Fenton Associates http://dfenton.com/DFA/
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