Electronic copies of music you own

[tbn.al]

Well, it happened to me in 1985. And the policy here in the MSO has changed since we had a copyright attorney interpret our need for us.

We also had a run in with a publisher and found that the advice of a copyright lawyer was in fact correct. Churches have a horrible reputation in the publishing world unfortuately. Our proceedures with regards church orchestra are as follows. We never hand out the last copy of anything. One copy is held in reserve as a master. All the marked up copies are destroyed after performance. We purchase enough copies so that there is an original in the file for every performer. We just don't use them. The exception is that most of the church orchestra music today gives you the right to make multiple copies from a single original for all players, but the old stuff does not. For example you buy the piece and there is only one Clarinet 1&2 part supplied. You are expected to make a copy for the 2nd player.

Choral music is a bigger problem for the publishers. There are folks who will buy one copy of an octavo and copy it for a 100 voice choir. Although it happens a lot, it is morally wrong and illegal. We sometimes copy music to make up performance books. Our Christmas program will have 20 or more titles form individual pieces and collections alike. The choir director extensively marks originals which are copied used for rehearsal and performance then collected and destroyed. A publisher called our hand on this and we were able to provide proof of original copys for every singer that performed. That was the end of that. This practice is legal.

[Rick Denney]

One thing to remember is that we are talking about civil law. The remedy for the copyright holder has two levels: 1. They can make you stop, and 2. they can make you pay damages.

If there are no damages (in other words, your copy did not deprive the copyright holder of legitimate sales or licenses), then there is nothing for the copyright holder to pursue. In that case, the most they can make you do is stop. They do that with a cease-and-desist letter.

And if you deprived the copyright holder of only one legitimate sale, then it's probably unlikely that pursuing the damages will be worth it for them. But they still might send you a cease-and-desist letter. It becomes an issue with wholesale distribution (such as with Napster) or with rights to public performance, where there were potentially thousands of paying customers.

So, making a copy for my own use is not likely to attract enforcement, especially since they'll never know.

But the moral issue has to be considered, too. I always, always buy the music I use, if and when it is available to be bought. Beyond that, I ain't sayin'.

Rick "thinking publishers deserve compensation, but don't always make it possible to provide it" Denney