I belong to an organization here in Pittsburgh called Calliope: the Pittsburgh Folk music society. We present a series of concerts in a 600 seat hall as well as a number of smaller events, and we run a folk music school. At any rate we pay ASCRAP a fee for all our lecture hall concerts, even when a lot of the performers play there own material or public domain. I think a lot of it is just qa rollover effect. A lot of the money they collect they have no legitimate claim to but they know a percentage will just pay it rather than defend themselves. Worse still, the bulk of the money they collect go to a very small percentage of the artists whose material is covered. in other words Paul McCartney gets the check when you play a Utah Phillips song. The biggest power they have is that if you don't pay, they may put you under a microscope and look for any excuse to harass you. For example; if one of your artists does a workshop beforehand and teaches a Liz Caroll tune, or at a post concert jam session or whatever. If you have nothing for them to find, there is really nothing tyhey can do. In an earlier thread re: mudcat under attack, somebody suggested that Mudcat could probably get some pro bono legal aid in the matter. I would think a library would definitely qualify if there is any sort of neighborhood legal services organization in the area. I'd like to hear how things work out for you. Please post again, or if you don't mind, e-mail me at rrayburg@hotmail.com

Best of luck,

Rich