Copyrights on Spirituals

Subject: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: GUEST,S.T.
Date: 01 May 05 - 10:20 PM

How can I make sure the acappella spirituals "Cd project" I'm about to work on/record will not run into any copyrights of the spirituals? Will I be fine since it's going to be a solo vocal recording of old favorites? Also, where can I find info. that will let me know *for sure* the spirituals I want to record are in the public domain?

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: wysiwyg
Date: 01 May 05 - 11:15 PM

Which songs are you planning to use, and what was your source?

Assuming you are talking about African American spirituals, are you aware of our AFRICAN-AMERICAN SPIRITUALS PERMATHREAD?

~Susan

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 01 May 05 - 11:18 PM

And don't neglect to mention the name of whatever country you happen to live in. Law does differ from one to another.

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: GUEST,S.T.
Date: 01 May 05 - 11:25 PM

I live here in the U.S.

I plan to sing songs like This Little Light Of Mine, Steal Away, Everytime I Feel The Spirit, Standing In The Need Of Prayer, Motherless Child, Jacobs Ladder and others. I just want to make sure I go about this in the right way to avoid getting sued, etc. I don't want a lawyer knocking at my door. I plan on selling the Cds by the way.

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: GUEST,S.T.
Date: 01 May 05 - 11:28 PM

Btw, some of the Spirituals will come from the Mudcat Permathread.

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 01 May 05 - 11:36 PM

I am feeling a part-with-some of the UK-Misanthropes

WHY Don't ALL of the repeated "copyright" or "intellectual P" threads .... spiral back onto themselves????

Is it the stars....is it the clone's karma....is it the film venue "groundhogsday" that forces us into this spiraling shell of re-examining ourselves?

Sincerely,

Gargoyle

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: Michael
Date: 02 May 05 - 06:15 AM

Surely the copyright of ALL spirituals belongs to HIM/HER.
Mike

Subject: RE: Copyrights on Spirituals
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 May 05 - 08:50 AM

ST, what I would suggest is that, using the index in the permathread, you use the threads for those songs to research the origin of individual songs; where there is not enough information on a given song, you could post a query in that thread.

If you find that a song is indeed thought to be from slavery time to the best of your information, and you are singing your own arrangement of the song, you can indicate yourself as the arranger on your liner notes and you should be all right.

One thing you definitely want to avoid is doing a song from a published arrangement, especially from an arrangement based on the concert spiritual or art song approach. IMO that's where you are likely to run into copyright concerns, unless you cite the publisher and get permission in advance.

How did you learn these songs?

Have you found any of the resources in the permathread helpful? If so, how? Might you post about that, in the permathread? And it you can share any information in the threads or in the permathreads, please, do!

~Susan