Re: [ARSCLIST] [was ARSCLIST] When you die...

["Farrington, Jim" <jfarrington@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Actually the letter came from Universal, the German publisher, because
there were numerous scores of Universal composers that weren't PD in the
EU. We got a similar letter for a 1909 song by Reynaldo Hahn that we had
posted, and the French publisher (who was not making this score
available in print, I might add), asked us--well, demanded--to take it
down because it was still protected by French copyright. Since we
control the content of our public domain scores site, we could simply
remove this item, whereas IMSLP, with hundreds of contributors, could
not afford to police every submission. We still have not completely
resolved to my satisfaction whether or not a copyright lawyer from
another country can dictate our policies as a U.S. institution.

What surprised me about this episode is that my money was on Warner to
send IMSLP this letter because some Gershwin had been posted, including
Rhapsody in Blue (which was one of the bellwether works that
precipitated the Sonny Bono CTEA ambush).

Jim

-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Karl Miller
Sent: Friday, November 02, 2007 10:01 AM
To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] [was ARSCLIST] When you die...

   
  An interesting case in point...The International Music Score Library
Project...from their web site:
  " On Saturday October 13, 2007, I received a second Cease and Desist
letter from Universal Edition. At first I thought this letter would be
similar in content to the first Cease and Desist letter I received in
August. However, after lengthy discussions with very knowledgeable
lawyers and supporters, I became painfully aware of the fact that I, a
normal college student, has neither the energy nor the money necessary
to deal with this issue in any other way than to agree with the cease
and desist, and take down the entire site. I cannot apologize enough to
all IMSLP contributors, who have done so much for IMSLP in the last two
years."

Basically, what happened, as far as I know, was that the site offered
scanned versions of public domain music. Well, some of it was not PD in
the US, hence the cease and desist letter.