Week 1 Blog Post 3: Response to Marty Denson

Hi Marty,

I completely hear you about individuals involved in the "art" of sampling probably do not possess adequate musical skills and thus revert to thievery.

Consider this however, during many classical music eras, especially the Baroque period, the practice of "borrowing" material from other composers was widely accepted and actually considered to be a sign of respect and admiration for the composer from which you "stole" from. Granted I understand that at this level it is quite different when you compare it to today's run of the mill "music producer" creating "mixes" in their parents basement. I think though there is something to be said about music creation today being more accessible to a greater amount of individuals because of technology. With it you bring some not so good art but every once in a while you do get inspiring masterpieces.

Marty Said:

Being involved in the music industry for nearly 34 years and the printing industry for 21 years, copyright issues have always been an important part of everyday conversation for me. The documentary “Good Copy/Bad Copy” is yet another look at the evolving issues and changes regarding copyright laws. The documentary enlightened me as to just how far the concepts of audio sampling has reached. While these individuals have demonstrated creativity with their “Techno Brega” style of manipulating the original works of others, I honestly believe that it is really just form of creative theft. It appears as though the individuals in the documentary clearly recognize that what they are doing is illegal, however, the ways to police this kind of copyright infringement is extremely difficult. Furthermore, I have noticed that the majority of those who practice the art of sampling do not possess any real musical skills and are left with no other alternative but to use other people’s works without permission rather than be original.     

Week 1 Blog Post 1 Reading: Copyright

Music Print Copyright: What’s fair use?

Although we have talked a little about copyright previously in this program, I really appreciate the in depth lessons, videos, articles and discussions on copyright.  I think it has helped to clear a lot of questions and uncertainties.  It seems like we should have had this in month 1 or month 2. 

Music stand photo by _e.t retrieved May 4, 2011

from http://www.flickr.com/photos/45688285@N00/119402174/

I think I still have one lingering question regarding music print copyright.  The question has to deal with photocopying printed music for students to use in lieu of the original parts.  Is it legal to make photocopies of printed music for student use?  This would entail making multiple copies of the same part. This discussion is often had within the community of band directors, as we all seem to believe that we are violating the law and will be hauled off to jail should they ever catch us or decide to seek legal compensation.  There also seems to be a wide variety of opinions and anecdotes about what constitutes Fair Use, so I’m interested to get more opinions and to know really what is legal and what is not.

There are several reasons for why band directors would make photocopies:

1.     Student responsibility and treatment of sheet music falls way short of what is needed to adequately preserve the original music.  Printed music by itself can last for many years and be enjoyed by many generations of students, however in the hands of students you may be lucky if it lasts 2 years.  (Yes even with speech after speech about responsibility and proper handling) 

2.     As a band teacher I also want to encourage my students to write in their music to place reminders about tempo changes, key signatures, dynamics etc.  The act of writing helps them in the learning process.  However if students receive already written in music then that sort of defeats the purpose, and there is always the possibility of errors from previous students or changes made by the director.

3.     The cost to purchase music for a band or orchestra ranges from $50 - $100 per piece.  Within this piece there generally is not enough parts to provide sheet music for every member of a particular section.  For example you may have 8 clarinet parts in a score but have 20 clarinets in your band.  This is clearly not enough even for students to share.  They also need music to take home to practice as well.  At the middle school we generally perform for each group between 12 – 20 pieces in a given year, depending on the group and may have up to 6 different groups.  So you might imagine the cost to purchase and maintain music could reach into the 10s of thousands.  Of course there is no budget to purchase music in most districts (at least in California) so music needs to be purchased through fundraising.  This creates a powerful motivation to want to make copies in order to preserve the original music and protect the investment.

Sheet music store sign photo by lucas.  Retrieved May 4, 2011 

from http://www.flickr.com/photos/lucas_gonze/3920271508/

These reason of course are not valid legal reasons for making photocopies but just helps to enlighten you on the dilemma.  I would like to know definitively if making photocopies of purchased music for student use falls under Fair Use.  I tend to believe that it meets the parameters set by Fair Use, however there are quite a few colleagues who believe that the law is black and white and that massively reproducing copyrighted music is not legal and that those who are doing it are breaking the law.