Don Hart wrote:
An artist has contacted me and requested a score of a yet unpublished
composition of mine. This person, previously unknown to me, appears (on
line) to be well qualified as a potential performer of the work, and I would
like to get the score to him. I seek advice on the following:
- Is there an advantage in sending either a pdf or a hard copy?
Other than speed and ease of delivery of the ~.pdf, I cannot think of an
advantage either way.
- What options are available, other than placing a copyright notice on
the work, to help restrict the use of this score to the stated intent
of this artist (consider the piece for performance)?
One thought I had was to put some sort of watermark, or the like, on several
pages of the score. Has anyone done this? Is there some way to do this in
Finale so that it would show up and print out in pdf form?
The printers I've used (and Epson 1120, and now a Ricoh Aficio 610 N)
both make provisions for watermarks. I'm not sure Finale does, though I
vaguely remember a capability for transparency in graphics; I've never
used it.
This appears to be a very legitimate request and I have no reason to suspect
that this person is being dishonest in any way. I want to be helpful and
appreciative of his interest, but I don't want it to seem like I'm ready to
give my music away for free, which I'm not.
I would do one (or perhaps both) of two things: first, offer send him a
~.pdf of a a few pages of the score for evaluation purposes; in this
instance, "a few pages" is the first couple of pages of each movement,
and if there are pages which are significantly different from the
movement in which they occur, some of those pages, too. This would be a
parallel to the situation where, if the score in question were
commercially published, and available in a retail environment, the
interested party could pick up a copy of the score, and evaluate a few
pages to determine whether the work was one which inspired enough
interest to purchase. I would also offer him the opportunity to
purchase the complete score, at a price that would be consistent with
the price if the score were commercially published. I would explicitly
state that the purchase of the score does not involve performance and
mechanical rights; these must be negotiated separately.
ns
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