The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #145640 Message #3372456
Posted By: GUEST,Buskerjoe
05-Jul-12 - 02:20 PM
Thread Name: Copyright bewilderment - 'Those Brown Eyes'
Subject: RE: Copyright bewilderment - 'Those Brown Eyes'
Re: why i'm hesitating to pay the royalities --
milwaukee blues, those brown eyes, big rock candy mountain.... all these songs are out there swimming in the folkosphere, passed around, unlike Ruby Tuesday or Light My Fire. DArling copied guthrie, who copied mathis, who copied Fay and the Jay walkers, who copied..... who knows?
so years from now, when someone learns it from my recording, do they owe my heirs? i've got a few songs i've written myself, and yes i can see charging some coins if someone wants to record them, or at least ask my permission. but each of those guys above (guthrie, et al) took it and recorded it. i guess it's different if you're backed up by a producer like whoever didi teh tarriers, or lomax in guthrie's case. those of us living out of our guitar cases have a harder time coughing up hundreds.
and how does fox come in on this? they buy and sell, kind of like the mortgage bundlers.. reminds me of the song hazel dickens sang:
rich folks sell junk bonds, do S & L scams
we fight their bloody wars in far-away lands
I've worked hard, stayed honest & got by somehow
making a living by the sweat of my brow.
and i see, for example, the FRC, field recorders collective, releasing CD's with old time musicians, financed on a shoestring, with scores of songs not in the public domain, but songs that have become part of the folk repertoire. wreck of the 97, no hiding place down here, red wing, when the roll is called up yonder, casey jones... can't think of all the titles, but obviously a significant part of them are still under copyright.
for a guy who earns only a few thousand bucks a year and would like to step up a rung on the revenue ladder, it seems a legitimate use of time to make sure i've researched this as thoroughly as i can before sending yet another check, especially when i have to make it out to mafiosos who themselves wrote no songs, but buy up rights knowing they'll turn a profit on enough of them to justify the ones that never move. it rankles me, is all.
and while i'll grant that the duplicator's job isn't to do my copyright research for me, i expected that, like artwork or mastering, it is a specialized enough detail, like pulling permits for a building contractor , that they would have been at least half as helpful as this bunch of generous strangers has been in mudcat.
they also wanted me to document that milwaukee blues is public domain, and the amount of time it's all taking places my project in peril. the clock ticks, the purse grows lean faster than the bewilderment lessens. but i am getting there. mostly thanks to you guys.
more as i actually resolve this. grandkids and july 4th busking also have their demands on my schedule.