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My Photos Of My Sheet Music Collection


bellowbelle

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I have a photo gallery for pics of my (mostly old) sheet music. There are a LOT of songs. I haven't even posted a quarter of them yet, I'm guessing. I just added 49 more pics tonight.

 

Of course, they are all in various conditions and some of them smell like moth balls, etc. -- but, most of them have the complete song intact. (And my interest is primarily in the song content.)

 

I have separate galleries within the main gallery for songs with chord symbols, ukulele and guitar diagrams, etc..

 

So....just mentioning this, in case anyone might see some song of interest there.

 

This is just a way for me to assess what's in my collection a bit better; I am not particularly offering sheet music for sale -- at least not at this time. BUT, if you want a specific one, I'd be apt to offer it for sale rather than to copy it for you, due to copyright laws, if any such laws applied.

 

So...the site is:

pbase.com/geranimom/sheetmusic

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...I am not particularly offering sheet music for sale -- at least not at this time.  BUT, if you want a specific one, I'd be apt to offer it for sale rather than to copy it for you, due to copyright laws, if any such laws applied.

Looks to me like most -- maybe even all -- of what you've posted is long past copyright and may now be freely copied without penalty.

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Looks to me like most -- maybe even all -- of what you've posted is long past copyright and may now be freely copied without penalty.

 

Mmm....maybe. I'd do my best to determine the status of any piece in question.

 

It can get so confusing, I think! For instance, I know that there's at least one sheet music dealer who bought/renewed the copyrights to some of the artwork -- the covers of sheet music. (At the moment, I'm too tired to really calculate the value or purpose of doing that.) At least that's what I was told.

 

So, if he notices me displaying the cover of....I dunno, maybe something like 'Alexander's Ragtime Band' or something, he could probably say, 'Remove that photo, I own that copyright.'

 

However, the way I understand it, there's nothing wrong with showing ANY photo if you are showing photos of a personal collection. I have a collection of sheet music and it makes no difference who owns what copyrights, as far as me simply displaying my collection goes. (If it does -- it shouldn't! That would seem pretty weird, to me.)

 

If I were to use a copyrighted cover image in some kind of advertising, though, then I'd be wrong.....I think.

 

As for the songs themselves....some could still be protected under copyright. Stuff from the 1920s, etc.. But, while photo-copying such pieces and selling them would be technically illegal, selling the actual physical copy of the sheet music as a collectible is not.

 

I think I've got that straight. Until it gets crooked again, at least.

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I'm insanely jealous of your collection.

 

It's always been my understanding that anything before 1921 is in the public domain. Hence the large collections of sheet music offered up by universities and government sites:

 

http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/sheetmusic/

http://levysheetmusic.mse.jhu.edu/browse.html

http://library.msstate.edu/ragtime/main.html

http://ucblibraries.colorado.edu/music/smp/browse.html

 

Most of them have a phrase like this: " To our knowledge, all of the music presented on this web site is in the public domain as it was published in the United States before 1923. However, it is the users' responsibility to determine that this is truly the case before using the materials for other than educational purposes."

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I'm insanely jealous of your collection....(etc.)

 

They just kept moving in!! Sheet music, that is. I even got rid of some, before I realized people collected it. (Though, I have a suspicion that it's lurking around here somewhere.) My grandfather had a bunch, and my husband did, and then more just kept showing up. I think I've only intentionally bought about 2 pieces of old sheet music, myself, though I've bought some contemporary songs.

 

.....Most of them have a phrase like this: " To our knowledge, all of the music presented on this web site is in the public domain as it was published in the United States before 1923. However, it is the users' responsibility to determine that this is truly the case before using the materials for other than educational purposes."

 

Good sites. I've seen the first two but not the last ones. Shall refer to those, too! And yes, very good phrase...whenever I get more specific about my photo site, I'll have to add something like that.

 

There is (was?) another really great site for old sheet music references (pics, midis, lyrics, etc.) -- melodylane.net, but it required a membership and mine dwindled away after a while.

 

 

typo edit.

Edited by bellowbelle
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