Copyright?

[JimLucas]

I've just noticed that the latest entry in the Tune-O-Tron is "Green Fields of France (Willie McBride)". It includes no indication that this song (originally titled "No Man's Land") and it's tune were written by Eric Bogle, nor that it is copyrighted material.

 

I suspect that it's appearance in the Tune-O-Tron would be a violation of copyright law even if a notice were added to indicate the copyright owner. I don't think that the differences between the version in the Tune-O-Tron and that published by Eric Bogle himself make it a different tune and not covered by the copyright, especially given the title.

 

It's all very nice to have tunes -- and words -- available, but posting of copyright material without the express permission of the copyright holder is a violation of the law, and could leave Concertina.net open to potential lawsuits. That should be the last thing we want to have happen here.

 

I will admit that with many session tunes it's hard to pin down whether they are old or new, or -- in the latter case -- who wrote them and whether they mind having them published for free. Then again, how many of us even bother to ask?

[Chris Ghent]

This is a good tune to take as an example of the need for attribution. I have heard Eric Bogle has had trouble almost to the point of violence when playing this song in Ireland, from people objecting to him saying he wrote it, as they associate it so strongly with the Fureys.

 

Chris

[JimLucas]

This is a good tune to take as an example of the need for attribution.

And proper attribution.

 

I remember a young fellow (well, he was young then, but so was I) doing a floor set, and he introduced a one of the songs he did as having been written by Paul Stookey. It was actually one of the Child ballads, but it hadn't occurred to him that PP&M might be doing non-original material. (Maybe it was also on one of their albums with the arrangement attributed to PS?)

 

Don't make assumptions. Make inquiries.

[dbowers]

Attribution is often a non-trivial matter. For instance, in the case of the Child ballads, Child only collected the words. Paul Stookey may have written or adapted the particular melody in question.

 

Or consider "Danny Boy" a.k.a. "Londonderry Air". I know of at least 3 sets of lyrics from F.E. Weatherly's "Danny Boy" to a saccharine Victorian love-song by Thomas Moore (who wrote "The Minstrel Boy") and it appears there are many, many more. The melody is even more problematical. It was sent to collector George Petrie by a Miss Jane Ross who claimed it was very old. She may have collected it or written it herself. No one knows. You can read the whole story here.

 

I personally consider all attributions to be at least a little suspect, unless someone can show me a copyright.

[JimLucas]

Attribution is often a non-trivial matter.

Defintiely.

 

For instance, in the case of the Child ballads, Child only collected the words. Paul Stookey may have written or adapted the particular melody in question.

More likely he got it -- directly or indirectly -- from some contemporary Scottish or English singer. But since I don't even remember which Child ballad it was, I can hardly ask him (I understand he is still alive). I don't see much point in pursuing this one further.

 

In fact, I'm sorry I brought that up, because my real point was and still is that one should at least try to find out whether a song or tune is contemporary and/or under copyright. And if you are unable to find out, that does not mean that it's "traditional"; it means that you don't know its status, and that is what you should say. Don't leave it blank. Don't say "anonymous" (which means "nameless"). Say, "I don't know who composed it."

 

All too often, of course, somebody else has labelled a tune as "traditional" when it was really written by Ed Reavey, Cathol MacConnell, Liz Carroll, or someone else still alive. Then how are we to know? There are limits to how far an individual can go in researching origins, of course, but one can still try to be careful. Don't ask, "Is that traditional?" Ask, "Where did you learn that?" If they learned it from one of the pre-WWII collections, then it's probably safe to assume it's no longer copyright, though even on many of those an author was named. (Carolan more than most others.) But if they say, "Altan's 'Red Crow' CD," then before you started spreading unattributed copies, you should look that up to see whether Altan listed an author.

 

Similarly, if you learned a tune in a session but did not learn where it came from, then when someone asks you its origin the only honest answer is, "I don't know."

 

Now you may think that the copyright laws are old-fashioned, inapprorpriate, etc. (I think they're very wrong in many ways), but they are still the law. And according to the law, putting something into the Tune-O-Tron is "publication" (a word which at its root means "making public"). If you violate copyright laws when you do that, you could be endangering Concertina.net itself. Please don't.

[Ken_Coles]

Paul clearly states in the directions he originally wrote to go with the Tune-O-Tron that copyrighted material is NOT to be posted for just the reasons Jim cites and sums up so aptly. Please observe this folks, or I will have to add going through hundreds of tunes for authorship to my already groaning "in" box. A song whose lyrics talk about WWI should tip you off, if you don't know Eric Bogle's work already, that it is a modern composition and likely attributable.

 

If you are aware of copyrighted material in the ToT, let me or Paul know by email so we can remove it. Let's stay on top of this so we don't have to lose a valuable resource.

[moonsagotunes]

Here are a few sites that I've used at times:

 

http://www.web-helper.net/PDMusic/default.asp

 

and

 

http://www.pdinfo.com/default.htm

 

and also there's some copyright info at:

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/cc/index.html

 

I found the above, 'Copyright Commons' when I was finding out about the (USA) laws re 'parody.' It was interesting! And, by the time I was through reading, I was...even more confused. Of course, that's exactly what keeps people going to court....if no one was confused, there would be no more court cases.

 

Also, I was researching the Sonny Bono law...that was a bit interesting, too. (But, just a bit.)

 

Eventually, though this mainly regarding crochet patterns, I just decided that if one is being honestly original, not copying, then, s/he's safe. But, hmmm...it can seem spooky, IF someone particularly decides to go after a person.

 

There's a lot of stuff that is considered 'okay' until someone raises a question. I'd posted a humorous/sarcastic poem online somewhere...at a site that has since closed down, as I recall -- where I used a line something like, 'If happy little pigeons fly, above the (blank)-Mart, why, oh why can't I?' So, of course, someone pointed out that I was 'stealing' from 'Somewhere Over The Rainbow.'

 

Duh. Yeah, I know....that's called parody. They do it all the time on Mad TV, etc.. BUT -- since there was a question, I did remove the poem. And, I looked up some info about parody. I was quite surprised to find out that it's a real snag, for some people -- for instance, the case with ... what was that, a book? --- 'The Wind Done Gone,' parody of 'Gone With The Wind.' (Actually, I think they did end up winning their parody rights, in court.)

 

 

Anyway.....getting wordy, here...

 

So, whatever, I try to be careful, but, no point in being strangely paranoid about it. Now, I'm off like a happy little PIGEON...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

I came back and edited...I remembered, it wasn't BLUEBIRD that I'd used, I used PIGEON.

Edited March 30, 2004 by bellowbelle