The composer (or his publisher) will hold all rights to the work anyway, however many times it is arranged. You, as an arranger will only be entitled to a fee for making the arrangment and/or engraving work. You cannot expect to get any royalties as the work is recent and therefore under copyright, I presume by the composer. Your 'claim' to the arrangement will be futile as you are not the owner of the original. Getting a written 'credit' for the arrangement is another thing between you and the composer, but he still doesn't have to as you are being contracted for a one-off. That's probably why it is offered under union rates. This has always annoyed me. There is a train of thought that the arranger, in making an arrangement of a specific work, is doing the composer a big favour by increasing the performance of the composer's work - especially when it is for a different medium and then gets recorded or published. But the arranger is not entitled to any royalty unless the work is out of copyright. Publishers are often asked for over-inflated 'permission' fees so that a particular work may be arranged, published and sold (all at the publisher's expense) yet it will be the composer/original publisher who will benefit in the longterm from performance and recording royalties. In your case above, I would make the contract very clear in respect to the composer accepting your arrangement(s) and engraving as produced, otherwise you may find yourself in an endless round of alterations, changes and re-writes to suit his idea of what is acceptable. Jonathan |
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