Sheer, Miriam. "The Godard/Beethoven Connection: On the Use of Beethoven's Quartets in Godard's Films." The Journal of Musicology, 18.1 170-188.

This article by Miriam Sheer discusses Godard's artistic use of Beethoven's string quartert in four of his films, and how this use reflects his sensitivity to the social differentiation of musical styles. His specific mixing of musical styles in certain films emphasizes their respective social connotations, and complements the situations and personalities of the characters whom they accompany. Sheer quotes an interview with Abraham Segal in which Godard said, "I try to use music like another picture which isn't a picture, like another element. Like another sound, but in a different form."

The description of Godard's use of Beethoven in many of his films parallels a commentary on his use of jazz in Breathless. His use of jazz references the classic American crime drama, in which jazz is used to insinuate impending moments of danger.  In Breathless, jazz is used in countless situations such as when Michel picks up newspapers, which warn of his imminent arrest, and in a crescendo just before he murders a cop. The rhythmic structure of jazz as a musical genre echoes the spontaneity and improvisational nature of the film and its protagonist (Michel). In contrast to Michel's jazzy motif, Patricia is often accompanied by more orchestral, dreamy and romantical music, which is more representative of her character.

Monahan, Mark. "Music that makes a man a killer Bernard Herrmann's film scores spoke as loudly as any dialogue, says Mark Monahan." The Daily Telegraph 1 July 2006. 8 April 2008.

Mark Monahan writes about Mr. Bernard Herrmann’s musical career spanning from Citizen Kane in 1941 through Taxi Driver in 1976.  Monahan asserts that creating music for motion pictures is an incredibly arduous task and that the people responsible for it are extraordinarily talented.  He feels that cinema would be unimaginable if not for the fantastic and wild feelings created by film scores.  Monahan writes that he considers Bernard Herrmann to be one of the leading film composers of the last 100 years.  Herrmann, a Russian born immigrant attended NYU to study music and made his Broadway debut at the young age of 20.  He began composing for CBS radio shows and this put him into contact with Orson Welles.  Welles took Herrmann on for the film Citizen Kane, and thereby launched the composer’s long and successful scoring career.  After Kane, Herrmann teamed with Hitchcock and was responsible for the musical scores of all the great Hitchcock films through the end of the 1960s.  Monahan has much respect for Herrmann’s talent. He writes that, “Rather than merely setting the scene or complementing the action (though they do both magnificently), [Herrmann’s scores] virtually are the action, brilliantly elucidating the characters' gnarled inner lives.”  He says that the opening scene of Citizen Kane (the ascending of Xanadu’s fence) is given “a sense of dread, regret and death of the soul…”  Herrmann’s most famous musical passage is the shrieking violins of the Psycho’s shower scene.  In his later career he works for French and American New Wave filmmakers. 

The musical score to any film is one of the most psychologically defining aspects of the experience.  The music, much like lighting, sets a mood.  Before the audience even knows what will happen on screen, they can get a sense of what might happen just based on the musical foreshadowing.  Herrmann brilliantly uses his musical score to set the mood and tone in Citizen Kane.  In happy scenes such as those with the young Kane attending parties in his honor, the music is light and we think nothing of it.  In more dramatic scenes such as the initial scene of Xanadu, the newsreel scenes, and the final scene of the film with the revelation of Rosebud, the music obviously takes a more dramatic and serious tone. 

Shumway, David R. “Rock 'n' Roll Sound Tracks and the Production of Nostalgia” Cinema Journal 38.2 (1999): 36-51
The article discusses the idea of soundtracks and their growth in modern film. A soundtrack is described as an album put together consisting of prerecorded music with the aim of linking ideas of the film with concepts that the audiences understands through recognized music. The article states that the concept of a rock and roll soundtrack became popular with the films The Graduate, and Easy Rider.  While The Graduate features pop music that provides nostalgia, Easy Rider includes music that represents youthful rebellion. The music in Easy Rider is diegetic, while it is not in The Graduate, but it is meant to be heard and contributes to the film. In Easy Rider, the music often exists to send a message and is the focus of attention. The article also touches upon the idyllic idea of generational cohesion that is present in the music of the film. The plot of the film abnegates the concept however, as the dreams of communalism are ended with the deaths of the main characters.  The article also discusses at length the nostalgic role of music in the films American Graffiti, The Big Chill, Dirty Dancing, and Baby, It’s You.
Reading this article provides acumen for Easy Rider as a complete work. The music becomes just as important as the plot, as it contributes to the message. The fact that the music in the film was all prerecorded instead of the film having a score supports the idea of auteurism because all of the music was chosen from the filmmaker's personal collection. The music also provides a way for the audience to connect to the story on a personal level. In moments when the music is the focus of the film, the viewer can feel the mood of the story and understand the message through lyrics.

This book by Charles Dowsett offeres his deep philological knowledge and insight into the legendary and almost mystical figure, Sayat Nova. It can be safely said that hardly anything was known to western world about this legendary Armenian troubadour Sayat Nova till this study was translated into French, and to English. His multilingual talent, that resembles the one of the subject matter, Sayat Nova allows him to look at the poems by Sayat Nova not only from mere literature point of view but also his multiculturality and internationality. 

In the book, Dowsett reveals the mystified life of Sayat Nova; The author scrupulously points out Sayat Nova’s international identity by nature; born into moderate Armenian family in Georgia, who spoke multiple languages including, Georgian, Armenian, Azeri, Turkish, and Persian, in which he produced his work of poetry and music. (His most famous work move fluently between all four languages.) He was active as court troubadour in Georgia in his early life, but was expelled to Armenia where he joined the local church to continue his practice. It also points out his extraordinary religious perspective and his life as a priest, and, importantly, the ethnic tolerance; he uses Persian vocabrary in many of his poems and appealed to Muslim audiences as well. In some of his poem he displayed his sympathy for Islam. He asserted that he perceived himself as “ bridge between the various Caucasian Peoples. For my own sake of argument, this legendary figure Sayat Nova, and the life of the director Sergei Paradjanov have undeniably much in common starting from their multilingual ability and intercultural identity as well as their broad range of active field.

Kosovsky, Robert. "[Untitled]." Rev. of Citizen Kane, the Magnificent Ambersons, by Bernard Hermann. American Music: 221-227.

 

Citizen Kane was the first film project on which Academy Award winning composer Bernard Hermann worked, and the music he created played an integral role in defining the characters of the film and crafting Citizen Kane as a creative work. This article explains the role that Bernard Hermann played in making Citizen Kane a great film, the relationship between Hermann and Welles, and explains the technical side of how Hermann made the different “cues” for the film.

As is mentioned in the article, Hermann and Welles both worked on radio in their early careers, where Hermann composed and arranged upwards of 2,500 shows for CBS. This is where Welles and Hermann met, both exploring their respective arts and collaborating occasionally on shows, including Welles’ famous rendition of War of the Worlds that sent thousands of people across the United States into hysterics. When Welles got his first film deal to make Citizen Kane, he insisted upon having Hermann do the music, giving Hermann his first opportunity to compose for a film. Hermann proved to be exceptional in this and his future projects because while he understood that the primary role of a film score was to complement the visuals of the film, his extensive experience in radio ensured that his scores could act as standalone pieces, as well.

Also, the article discusses the technical side of composing for cinema, explaining how Hermann used “leitmotifs” – a kind of recurring musical motif in reference to a character, location, or theme – to strengthen the relationship between the score and the visuals, creating leitmotifs for many of the films key players, Rosebud, and the various mental states that Kane experienced throughout the film.

This article specifically speaks of communication through music while emphasizing the importance of human behavior that is recognized based on the context of music. The author states that while it is easy for even the untrained ear to understand the artists' temperament while listening to a particular song, this analysis can go beyond one person and can be applied to an entire culture. This is possible because one can frame "behavior" in a cultural setting. Thus, if a culture has a particular ‘style' of music that it can be broken down into, this ‘style' is a reflection of the culture itself and a progression or change in that style within a framework of time is representative of change within that culture. The author uses a system of "cantometrics" for rating a song and eventually leading to the possibility of using song as an indicator of "social and psychological pattern in a culture."

Pather Panchali literally translates to "path of song" or "song of the little road." Panchali here specifically refers to a type of narrative folk song that was performed in Bengal in the early twentieth century. Thus the name of the film is itself representative of the time period it was made in, as well as the culture it alludes to. Composed by maestro Ravi Shankar, the music stays noticeably in tune with the emotional stability of the characters that live in a remote village in Bengal in the 1950's. The art of the music is wedded to the truth of the characters themselves and thus the movie as a compositional whole becomes reflective of the lives of a poor family living in Bengal.

Celluloid Jukebox, edited by Jonathan Romney and Adrian Wootton, is a collection of essays from famous filmmakers and musicians all regarding the relationship of popular music and film since the 1950’s.  In this book, many essays make stark remarks on the influence of A Hard Day’s Night in the connection between pop music and film.  Andy Medhurst’s essay, for example, entitled “It Sort of Happened Here: The Strange, Brief Life of the British Pop Film”, on numerous occasions makes the claim that “the film which irrevocably sundered that connection [between pop music and film] was A Hard Day’s Night,” and that “the kind of static on-stage set-piece that was one of the many causalities of the new approach [was] pioneered by A Hard Day’s Night.”  The section of the book, however, that is most supportive of my thesis is the final section of interviews, which asked a number of famous filmmakers what their favorite pop movies are.  In response to this question, Cameron Crowe, Amos Poe, and Allison Anders all claimed A Hard Day’s Night.
Allison Anders, a producer of many notable films such as Martin Scorsese’s Grace of the Heart, is quoted as saying, “the very first intoxicated experience of music and movies working together, needless to say, [was] A Hard Day’s Night.”  She then went on to say, “when I went to see the movie, I didn’t see the movie itself until I saw it for maybe the tenth time because we were screaming through the whole thing.  So it was like seeing a concert with all the little girls.”  This quote supports my thesis that A Hard Day’s Night was the first film to successfully unite the pop cultures of film and music in a way that no film previously had, and that it in fact is the first true rock and roll film.  Anders’ response to the film, like so many others’, was because of the novelty of the style of this production.  A Hard Day’s Night really was like watching a concert for an hour and a half on the silver-screen, and therefore was indeed a rock and roll film.  It was different than any other films that came before it, and it forever changed the way music and film interacted.  This book, Celluloid Jukebox, gives a great inside understanding of A Hard Day’s Night’s influence on music’s role in film.  It speaks of all the films to the present that have used pop music in a similar fashion to the 1964 Beatles’ comedy, and therefore is a great source for my thesis.

"The Indiana University Veriations2 and Variations3 projects use a work-based metadata model for discovery of musical sound recordings, scanned score images, and encoded score notation files. This model has been described as ³FRBR-like² and is mentioned in various discussions of FRBR-based systems, but it is not technically a FRBR implementation.

As the project team investigates long-term sustainability issues for the Variations3 software, we have begun thinking about what a truly FRBR-ized version of the metadata model would look like, and if changing to this type of model would make our system more sustainable and interoperable. As a first step towards answering these questions, members of the Variations3 project team have released a report outlining the potential application of FRBR to a system designed to deliver musical content in a library environment."

The goal of my research is to take a close look at Disney's history of successful feature animated and live-action musicals to demonstrate that these movies are the source of Disney's success and should be their current focus as well. I am specifically interested in the recent movie High School Musical, and I plan to use it as a case study about how musicals in general are a better source of entertainment for children. Disney's marketing of High School Musical made use of many new forms of media and took advantage of the cross-platform media available to such an all-encompassing conglomerate. I also will look at research studies concerning children's attentiveness to different forms of media to show that they are more likely to show repeated interest in and remember songs than standard dialogue. How many of your favorite childhood songs were from Disney movies?

Throughout Smith and Clark’s catalog of one hundred years of Disney endeavors, one particular element of their success is consistent: feature animation musicals. At practically every turning point in the company’s history, the great success that brought the studio back out of the red was always a successful feature animation, and not just that, but a musical too. Disney’s initial success in the business of cartoons was with Steamboat Willie (1928), which was the first “synchronized sound cartoon” and put Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse on the map (p. 24). Soon after, Walt and Roy Disney formed their own recording company to make back the money they spent on sound equipment. The world’s first feature-length animated film, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) was also the first film whose movie soundtrack was created using the original movie soundtracks, and it was the first film to have a merchandising campaign established to coincide with the release of the film into theaters. Everyone left the theater singing one of Snow White’s songs.
    The nineteen forties left Disney headed toward failure with the loss of their international markets because of the war. They invested everything they could in a new feature animation: Cinderella (1950), and they ended up with a huge success. The fate of the company rode on the success of the movie because of all of the labor and money put into creating it, and with both its score and the song “Bibbidi-Bobbidi Bo” nominated for Oscars, Disney realized that their salvation was in the creation of more feature animated musicals.
    Of course not every feature was as profitable. Disney invested over six million dollars in creating Sleeping Beauty (1959), its “most lavish and costly” film up to that point, but its initial release did not do as well as they’d hoped (p. 85). Luckily, Mary Poppins (1964) flew in with her umbrella and created a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious film that received thirteen Oscar nominations and five awards.
    The authors mark 1984 as the lowest point financially for Disney theatrical releases in thirty years. Under the new leadership of Michael Eisner and Frank Wells, though, the company started turning around. By 1989, The Little Mermaid put Disney back at the top. It was the first of five Disney feature animations in a row to win the Oscars for Best Original Score and Best Song, and it caused for “renewed excitement in the animation and musical genres” that set Disney straight for the next decade (p. 151). Beauty and the Beast, which was also nominated for Best Picture in 1991, Aladdin (1992), The Lion King (1994), and Pocahontas (1995), followed equally strongly, and reinvigorated Disney’s animation department. Again, the cause for success was feature animated musicals that brought back both audiences and awards.
    Following the entry for the final year, 1999, the authors take a look into the future at what Disney has planned for the upcoming century. They spelled out every bit of advance information they could get their hands on, and looking back, they were pretty dead on. Two of the major disappointments that they could not have anticipated were the movies Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) and Treasure Planet (2002). Their predicted success was based on the fact that they would have the same directorial and production staff that made the movies of the early nineties so incredibly successful. The missing piece? Music.

A Musical For Tweens Captures Its Audience - New York Times
Ben Sisario, February 8, 2006

    Ben Sisario examines the marketing strategy that went into Disney’s High School Musical and how it was able to engage its target audience with not-yet-standard techniques. The movie premiered on the Disney Channel on January 20th, and by February 8th it was already making news for its popularity. The soundtrack released with the movie reached top 10 of the Billboard charts, made 45 percent of its sales online through iTunes and had no radio airtime outside of Radio Disney’s station, and that was only in the first two weeks.
    Sisario quotes Gary Marsh, president of entertainment for Disney Channel Worldwide, as explaining the value of the story in its themes such as “express yourself, believe in yourself, celebrate your family, follow your dreams,” but it wasn’t just the optimism that made this movie and all of the other media associated with it into such a success. Because Disney’s presence exists across multiple forms of entertainment, it was able to use cross-platform advertising to build excitement about the movie before it was first aired. The show’s characters appeared on a New Years Eve show, the Disney channel played music videos from the movie’s songs “in heavy rotation,” and Disney even offered a free download of the song “Breaking Free” around the time of the premiere. After the movie aired for the first time, Disney directed viewers to a sing-along version online where they could download the lyrics. According to Sisario, the lyrics were downloaded 500,000 times in the first 24 hours. That’s successful cross-marketing.
    Disney capitalized on its integration of web content into the TV market, something that they’ve gotten very good at of late. They also benefited from the fact that the movie and soundtrack were released in the winter, specifically because of the holiday sales of iPods and iTunes gift certificates.
    Sisario sees this movie as the beginning of “a new musical phase,” referring to the previous cultivation of pop stars Brittney Spears, Christina Aguilera, and the members of ’N Sync. They are creating a new generation of pop icons following the success of Hillary Duff, which began with her TV show “Lizzy McGuire.” The most interesting element of the movie and album’s success is the fact that it did not rely on traditional radio or MTV for its publicity. They know that their audience, because of their age, is very comfortable with the internet and digital music, so they were able to make use of their own website and their relationship with Apple’s iTunes to set the movie up for success.

JSTOR: Music Educators Journal: Vol. 32, No. 5, p. 18-19. April 1946

http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0027-4321%28194604%2932%3A5%3C18%3AMOTAP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-O

    This article analyzes the use of music in animated cartoon movies, contrasting its use with that of live action films. Since animated movies are more exaggerated and are filled with constant motion, a composer needs to make his music do the same. Rodriguez begins by examining the role of music in movies more generally. He defines the difference between a screenplay with music and a musical by stating that screen plays use music to enhance the emotion of a scene or clarify a point to the viewer, but they keep the plot is still the central focus of the movie. In musicals, however, the plot can be completely swept to the side to make room for a musical number that has little to do with the actual story of the movie but is there for pure entertainment.
    Because cartoons are by their nature based in fantasy rather than reality, Rodriguez states that a composer working on a score for an animated movie has a much greater task ahead of him than if he were working on a live action film. The actions of the animated characters are timed down to the frame, which is 1/24th of a second. In order to fit the action perfectly, then, a composer must change his frame of reference from the usual beats per measure approach to beats per frame. This argument seems to work for live action as well, since in the end everything is broken down into frames to be projected, but Rodriguez claims that synchronization of action with music in live action films is coincidental and unlikely while it is “almost a rule of life with animation composers.” (p. 19) The music must be constantly active and moving, simply because the characters are. A good composer must know how to make his music as humorous and exaggerated as Donald Duck of Goofy but also be able to convey the tenderness and emotion found in many animated films. Rodriguez specifically mentions Dumbo, Bambi, and Pinocchio in the latter category.
    Although the subtitle of the article reads, “Will ‘Cartoon’ films have a place in music education?” the author only mentions music education in passing in his last paragraph. He laments that not enough researchers or critics are writing about how well cartoons can teach music to children. His idea of music instruction is creating an animation that is didactic in nature, instructing children about notes, musical structures, harmonies, and other complicated elements of music that are not easily explained otherwise. The fact that music can be added to animation would only serve to illustrate the different sounds that would be taught in the animation. In my opinion, his focus on education is quite limited to high level music theory and could be extended much further. Rodriguez mentions Fantasia in a reference to animation set to pre-composed music, but he failed to note how the animation visually conveyed the different elements and tones in the music, making the music’s qualities apparent both to the ear and to the eye.

 

MEDIA; The Top-Selling Tunes on Billboard, Sung by Children for Children - New York Times
Robert Levine, March 6, 2006

    The New York Times considered the growing market of children’s music important enough to report about. The news isn’t exactly news: music for kids, especially music recorded by other kids, is going to sell. Following the success of the soundtrack for High School Musical, which was the top album for 2006, other recording companies are seeing an opening for more albums for kids. The article highlights Kidz Bop, a series of albums containing covers of famous pop songs sung by children ages 8-12 with an “intentionally imperfect style.” The idea is that kids listening will want to sing along and can more easily imagine themselves as the rock star when the singers on the album aren’t easily identifiable and the vocals are less impressive. These albums, with the eleventh released this year plus a number of holiday and special edition releases, are part of the recent resurgence in children’s music.
    A quick check on Amazon.com reveals some interesting consumer reviews. Most of the reviews actually hate these CDs, but of course the reviewers are adults. They say Kidz Bop is ruining perfectly good and generally appropriate popular songs, and that some of the songs they’re picking are so far from appropriate that even when they’re edited it’s strange to hear such young kids singing them. But there are over thirty hits when searching with the terms “Kidz Bop” under Music on Amazon, so they must be doing something right.
    When the soundtrack for “High School Musical” was number one on the Billboard chart, spots two and three were also albums made for children. As most of the other music genres are noticing a decline in CD sales, children’s music is stable if not increasing. Recording labels are starting to take an interest in audiences too young to pirate their music. Razor and Tie, the independent label responsible for Kidz Bop, does most of their advertising directly television, and so far it’s been working well. They’re in direct competition with Disney, which has access to both the Disney Channel and Radio Disney to promote its music. At the time of the article, Disney was coming out with Devo 2.0 on its new label Disney Sound, described as “still safe, but it’s got a little bit of an edge,” by a marketing vice president at Walt Disney Records.

 

 

This annotated bibliography serves to support that: "Most rap music as an art form intrinsically relies on music sampling to exist. Current copyright law as it relates to fair use of music sampling severely limits hip hop artists and composers, almost to the point of killing the genre. Specifically, the case of Bridgeport v. Dimension Films outlaws the use of any sampling without proper payment to the copyright owner. This decision has made it impossible for the non-wealthy to enter the public hip hop market and limits the creativity of those already in."

Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Dimension Films, No. 01-00412—Thomas A. Higgins, District Judge (2005). 

This case involves N.W.A.'s song "100 Miles and Runnin" which has a two second sample from George Clinton Jr. and the Funkadelic's song "Get Off Your Ass and Jam". N.W.A. just took that 2 second clip, lowered the pitch and looped it on their song. Since this was done without getting consent from Bridgeport Music, Dimension Films was brought to court because N.W.A.'s song was featured on the soundtrack of one of their movies, I Got the Hook Up. Bridgeport, however, entered into two agreements with two of the owners of "100 Miles and Runnin", which granted them the license to sample so Bridgeport was originally ruled against by the U.S. district court. Bridgeport argued that "(1) that the sample was not protected by copyright law because it was not "original"; and (2) that the sample was legally insubstantial and therefore does not amount to actionable copying under copyright law." Then the case was taken to the Sixth Circuit. Here the court used the factors for exclusive rights in the Copyright Act of 1976 and ultimately ruled that Bridgeport's copyright rights had been violated.

One of the most important issues here would be that of de minimis. It is defined as something that is so small and insubstantial that it can be overlooked, which three notes seemed to be initially. The Sixth Circuit ruled that this and substantial similarity should not be factored in when ruling on a sound recording. Since there was no debate about whether or not part of "Get Off Your Ass and Jam" and was copied, which it was, the court ruled in favor of Bridgeport Music. This ruling ties heavily into the rap industry as de minimis is often relied upon by producers. While Vanilla Ice shouldn't be able to get away with using virtually the same song as another group without permission, it was often acceptable to take a small piece of another work and build off that. This ruling causes the prevention of this in many cases. Producers would not be able to borrow anything due to de minimis becoming outlawed in a sense for sound recording cases, which is where hip hop music needs it. If the law were to continually make rulings that further narrow the range for sampling, those rappers/producers without much money would be scared off because they could not borrow even the tiniest bit from another song, stifling their creativity due to a ruling against one of the conventions of their genre of music.

United States Copyright Office. Copyright Law of the United States and Related Laws Contained in Title 17 of the United States Code
This section of the United States Code prohibits the "unauthorized Fixation and trafficking in sound recording and music videos...without the consent of the performer or performers involved." In other words, it makes it clear that it is illegal to distribute music or music videos, online for example, without consent. According to the language used, it sounds like music videos are defined as recordings of live performances, rather than more abstract videos edited to reflect the content of the music. Elsewhere in the Copyright Code, phonorecords are defined as being separate from audiovisual works. But when music videos are available online, they become one more way for internet "pirates" to obtain a digital "phonorecord" without paying or receiving permission from the artist or copyright holder.

This is the only area where noticeable steps have been taken to stop the distribution of anime music videos. That is, stepping in on behalf of the interests of the musicians to control the distribution of their songs. Record companies are not beholden to the niche audience of anime fans, so are willing to act on the law when an infringement is brought to their attention. For the record company an entire creative work is being reproduced and transmitted in a music video; whereas for the copyright holders of a given anime, only relatively small portions of (if even the "heart" of) their works are reproduced. As they have done in various areas of internet music trafficking, music companies have the (moral or ethical) right perform the same way a domestic anime copyright holder would when faced with illegal distribution of an entire film or series. When a music video is downloaded, it is possible to detach the audio from the video and acquire the song on its own, or even just enjoy it in full as it plays over the video. Therefore using a song in a music video is closer to a clear-cut act of piracy than editing the video.

With this piece, James Johnson aims to provide guidance and an advanced starting point for general practitioners, intellectual property lawyers and entertainment attorneys on music licensing. To explain music licensing Johnson first imparts a fundamental understanding of relevant copyright law. It enumerates five exclusive rights of music copyright owners. (1) Reproduction is the right to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords. (2) Adaptation is the right to prepare derivative works based on the copyrighted work. (3) Distribution is the right to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work to the public by sale, rental or lease. (4) Public performance is the right to publicly perform the copyrighted work including by means of a digital audio transmission. (5) Public display is the right to publicly show a copy of sheet music or lyrics by means of a film, TV, motion picture or on the Internet. Therefore, inherent in these rights music has two distinctive sets of copyright protection: the rights to the musical composition, and the rights to the sound recording of the musical composition. The article offers a brief history of copyright acts of 1790, 1909, and 1976 as well as the 1995 Digital Performance Right in Sound Recording Act and the DMCA. It also walks through the various licenses necessary to utilize copyright music in different mediums and formats.

The article also urges practitioners to have clients who are songwriters join a performance rights organization such as ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC. The article describes the functions of the organizations to grant licenses, collect the license fees, and pay the royalties for a particular song to the copyright owner and to the songwriter, usually on a 50/50 basis. However, many recent agreements between songwriters and music publishers are allocating a greater share of the publishing income to songwriters, up to a 75 percent. A major task for practitioners is to determine when a license is required, who has the right to grant the desired license and what type of license is appropriate. For example, a blanket license allows a radio or TV station to perform any works in the performance rights repertory during the term of the license for a specific negotiated fee. The blanket license permits a licensee to perform or broadcast a large variety of copyrighted works without worrying about illegal infringements. It also facilitates administrative record keeping, which can result in more accurate payment of license fees to the correct parties.

Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music (92-1292), 510 U.S. 569 (1994)

The rap group 2 Live Crew used a sample of Roy Orbison and William Dees' "Oh, Pretty Woman" for their track, "Pretty Woman", on their album As Clean As They Wanna Be without Orbison's permission. This led to a copyright infringement case being filed by Orbison and a ruling by the Supreme Court which has great implications for both rap and music as a whole. 2 Live Crew's defense was that their song was a parody, and as such should be seen as fair use since a parody must borrow heavily from the original artwork in order to spoof it.

The court went through the 4 factors that typically determine fair use as outlined by the Copyright Act of 1976. On the first factor (The purpose and character of the use) the court determined that since 2 Live Crew's version of the song was fairly transformative, this outweighed the commercialism that would rule against fair use. As for the second factor (the nature of the copyrighted work), the Supreme Court decided that because the song is a parody, it intrinsically borrows heavily from a public, copyrighted work, and thus does not put too much weight on this factor for determining fair use. The third factor, (the amount and substantiality of the portion of the original work used), the court decided that as a parody, it was necessary for 2 Live Crew to borrow the "heart" of the work, however they differentiated their song enough from Orbison's by changing the lyrics heavily. For the fourth factor, (the effect of the use upon the market (or potential market) for the original work), they determined that it is unlikely for this work to substitute the original, and thus would not harm Sony's market.

This case is very important to music because it was one of the earliest to set down guidelines as for sampling in music, though it was a parody. Also, at this point, these types of cases were rare for courts to see, so the legislation for ruling on them was ill-defined. It was determined that parodies can not be automatically determined by an aggregate set of laws and must be tried on a case to case basis. Since rap music often samples in ways like 2 Live Crew did, this ruling essentially let the reigns free for other artists to sample music by diminishing their fears of it not being fair use. However, this is a parody and majority of rap songs are not, meaning that they are given less leeway when it comes to fair use.

Go to this site: http://www.findlaw.com/casecode/courts/6th.html and search for Bridgeport. Click Bridgeport v.WB Music Corp.

Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Warner Bros. Music Corp., 2004 FED App. 0233P (6th Cir.)

Bridgeport once again claims that due to sampling by Ice-T of the opening three notes of George Clinton's "Get Off Your Ass and Jam" in his song "99 Problems" on the Home Invasion album, their copyright rights had been infringed upon. A key factor that differentiates this case is that there is approval of the sampling, but Bridgeport believed it was entitled to more money than they initially received due to profit being made after the limitations period. UPIP, the label under which Ice-T recorded the song, had a mechanical license for the song and received royalties for it. This is not an issue because Bridgeport never asked for the license to be revoked, and thus could not be considered infringement. Bridgeport also targeted Ammo Dump Music and Carrumba Music, which it ultimately failed to win anything from.

This case is different from the others in that it is one that is both positive for the rap industry and for the evolution of copyright case law. Essentially, this case helped to solidify the fact that once rights are obtained to do something, such as sample music and make money off that new music, then it is hard to be taken away. Bridgeport received money to let the rights for "Get Off Your Ass and Jam" go, yet they were not satisfied with just that and attempted to glean more money off of the success of the derivative work. This case prevented them from doing so by outlining how the distribution of money and rights are once sampling is allowed. The immediate label Ice-T was part of here had 66.7% of the rights to his song while UPIP managed to acquire the other 33.3%. Bridgeport wanted that 33.3%, but was denied. This helps to further the rap industry because with its large amount of sampling, there has to be a certain amount of security in order to protect the money received from the money acquired after the rights for the sample are acquired. A label should not be able to get extra money off of a product unless it was agreed upon initially.

 

Grand Upright Music v. Warner Bros. Records, 02-cv-01662-RPM  780 F. Supp. 182 (S.D.N.Y. 1991)

This case involves Biz Markie's sampling of Gilbert O'Sullivan's, "Alone Again (Naturally)" for a song on Markie's album I Need A Haircut. Markie, under Warner Bros. Records, claimed that his sampling of 3 words and a small portion of O'Sullivan's song was fair use because Grand Upright Music did not have a valid copyright of the song. This turned out to be false as it was learned that Sullivan had indeed transferred the rights of the song to Grand Upright Music.

This is an important case to look at because unlike 2 Live Crew, who were told that they could not use the original work and did it anyway, Markie claimed that he sampled a song that he legitimately believed the rights were up in the air for. Also, 2 Live Crew set a precedent for the rap industry to begin using samples, whether they were approved of or not. This became part of rap music itself, and this point was argued by Markie's camp. The court did not factor this into their decision, ruling for an injunction against Warner Bros. citing that there was evidence that they tried to obtain permission for the song and was not able to, and thus had infringed on Grand Upright Music's rights. Their ruling was also rooted in the fact that the album could become commercially successful using a song that willfully infringed upon the rights of another.

Rap music as stated above hinges on the fact that sampling is part of the industry. Markie's loss in court serves as an antithesis to what happened in the 2 Live Crew case. Here, a rapper is penalized for sampling a song, even with the attempt of trying to secure the rights. Instead of rappers and producers gaining more confidence in sampling music, this case most likely drove some away. At that point, it could even be seen as the catalyst to a fall in the genre. It also sent a message that the attempt to obtain rights was not heavily valued, just whether they were attained in the end or not.

Randal Picker's article characterizes scope-of-permission goods and discusses the ramifications of allowing or limiting such goods. The article describes scope-of-permission goods as a form of private public goods, exclusion is possible but an individual's consumption of the goods does not impair another's consumption of identical goods. Therefore, the same goods are delivered with arbitrary amounts of access. In the absence of rivalry in consumption, the use of the goods does not prevent or limit another's use. Examples of these goods which are operated by granting different levels of access to individuals include satellite TV, computer software, and copyrighted works. Therefore, these markets exist due to entry barriers, pre-existing as with copyright or created by the organizations in the field as with Microsoft's development of software. Excluding individuals' opportunity for consumption through market organization, technology, or law raises the issue of whether or not barriers should be diminished to allow for greater entry.

The section of copyright focuses mainly on performing rights organizations. The article focuses on how in recent years ASCAP's blanket licenses have been reduced. Additionally, there have been measures to impose greater pricing consistency for blanket licenses and newly established sublicenses. Reducing the scope of ASCAP's permission control is theoretically designed to lower costs for licensees when they reduce the use of PROs' music. This also makes it possible for broadcasters to substitute music from another source, which can encourage competition in the provisions of music by copyright collectives.

Marshall, Wayne. "Giving Up Hip-hop's Firstborn: A Quest for the Real after the Death of Sampling" Callaloo Vol 29 (2006)

This journal article uses ?uestlove of the hip hop group, The Roots, to highlight how today's artists are dealing with copyright law. The Roots are notorious in the modern day industry because they sample very minimally due to the fact that they play their own instruments, and thus, create their own music with them. Because of this they are able to create hip hop without conforming to the traditional method of sampling in order to create beats. The traditional method is often seen by as consumers as a necessary element to create "authentic" hip hop music. While ?uestlove obviously believes real hip hop can be made other ways, he acknowledges that sampling is too common for the art to thrive under current copyright law. To show how difficult it is, he provides real examples of the costs of some samples, with the average being $8,000 each. Most hip hop artists that have not broken out yet would not be able to pay such ridiculous fees.

The most important thing about this journal is the issue of authenticity. This helps to understand why it is essential for rap artists to have samples instead of just accepting it as a given. Not only does it create a connection to the origins of the musical style, especially when it comes to vinyl records, samples also challenge the idea of musical ownership. This is to say that, hip hop is based on a belief that music ultimately does not belong to anyone, it is for the community to enjoy, and as such should be used by anyone freely. This closely coincides with pushes for the public domain to be expanded. ?uestlove also incorporates anti-copyright messages into his music in order for fans to realize the bleakness of the situation. An example is given where a DJ begins to manipulate beats but is abruptly stopped stating that showing off his talent "would cost too much".

Susan A. Russell's article consists of four parts: an overview of web casting, groups and arguments involved in the web casting debate, web casting legislation, and the future of web casting. The overview in part one defines web casting as internet radio. It is considered different from over-the-air-broadcasts in that it offers more highly-themed genres. Part two divides the debating parties into two groups: those in favor of governmental regulation and those opposed. The groups seeking governmental regulation are concerned with the copying and broadcasting of illegal recordings such as the unauthorized broadcasts of live concerts and illegal downloads, which can adversely affect CD sales. These groups also defend CD prices because of the factors that go into production: recording costs, studio fees, studio musicians, sound engineers and producers, marketing and promotion costs. Due to these costs less than ten percent of all new CDs that enter the market each year are profitable. Opposing organizations such as Boycott-RIAA and CAR (Citizens Against RIAA) claim governmental regulation cannot benefit both artists and record companies. These groups claim web casting can have a beneficial promotional effect. Furthermore, they claim that overall production costs are typically deducted from the artists' royalties so CD sales primarily benefit record companies. Part four concludes the article by expressing concern for blocking the internet's ability to divest information.

Part three brings performance rights organizations into the discussion. The Digital Performance Rights in Sound Recording Act of 1995 and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act addressed the issue of digital technology and web casting since previous copyright acts could not anticipate the influential effects of these media. The 1995 act created provisions that cable and satellite audio should pay royalties through a subscription service; however, it did not address web casting. Therefore, the DMCA was faced with formulating governmental regulations during its consideration of web casting. Congress set conditions that licensees must meet in order to obtain a statutory license. First, licensees must agree to pay royalties in addition to licensing fees. Second, they must follow Congress' set limitations as to the frequency and the diversity of songs web cast. Third, web casters must employ available measures to ensure that the listener does not copy the music broadcast over the Internet. While ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC provide the standard license agreements, Congress created a new governmental organization, SoundExchange, to collect additional royalties.

Kersting, Jeffrey F. "Singing a Different Tune: Was the Sixth Circuit Justified in Changing the Protection of Sound Recordings in Bridgeport Music, Inc. v. Dimension Films?" University Of Cincinnati Law Review Vol 74 (2005)

Though Bridgeport v. Dimension has been touched upon, this journal article helps to understand why sampling is outlawed and questions whether the ruling was fair. The author has a clear disapproving view of the Sixth Circuit circumventing law conventions that were already in place such as testing for substantial similarity and considering de minimis. Here, their methodology is key, and is broken up into seven parts.

The first is that the ruling only applies to sound recordings. The second is that it acknowledges that this is a completely brand new test as it found the district court's testing, using substantial similarity and de minimis, inappropriate for the case. Third, it was decreed that originality of the derivative did not matter as long as it could be proven that a copyright existed for a work that was sampled from. Fourth and fifth, all samples would be defined as digital samples and tried as such. Sixth, there is acknowledgement that the popularity of hip hop music and technological innovation has increased the amount of sampling taking place. Seventh, the court believed that this new test would be beneficial for both the courts themselves and for the music industry as a whole. The argument behind this is that they are allowing artists to duplicate sounds independently, but not in arranged way that has already been copyrighted. Their claim is that this still allows for creativity to flourish. Also, the fees for licenses will be kept in check. Last, they feel this is necessary because there is no accidental copyright infringement when it comes to samples.

The author believes that this method is flawed because it does not differentiate between different types of copyrighted works and points out loop holes that would allow de minimis and substantial similarity to be used. This would greatly help the hip hop industry in that their specific type of music would no longer be pigeon-holed. This article illuminates the fact that special case law had been created to judge a specific type of music. Even the creators of the legislation mention it. If rap artists and producers were to be judged by the standard that most copyright infringement cases were, it would help them win more cases and would be fairer.

William Nye's article deals with the issue of blanket licensing by performance rights organizations. The article addresses the concern of PROs that they do not have enough control of royalty distribution because mechanical and performance compensation is separated, and the opposing view that organizations such as ASCAP, BMI, and SESCA already have too much control. The article examines the antitrust litigation pertaining to blanket licensing of music catalogues which went on for nearly 60 years. The most notable cases concerning television involved CBS and the Buffalo trial. Following the court's decision to uphold the legality of blanket licenses in the CBS trial, the Buffalo trial raised "competing away" and "public good" arguments. This article examines both positions from a purely economic standpoint. "Competing away" claims that if copyrighted music was licensed at its source, competition would lower the up-front fees for television production. PROs supported the "public good" argument which states blanket licenses allow for lower synchronization fees and encourage the use of music in television. The article examines the economic value of both arguments. While it finds some merit in both positions the author sides with "competing away" as slightly more cost effective than the "public good" model.

This article provides some insight into the complexity of the litigation by demonstrating the effort economists, attorneys, judges, and the public have put in determining the net value licensing options. The magnitude of concern regarding PROs is also verified by the fact that the entire dissertation focuses on only two of the numerous competing hypotheses surrounding the issue. While the findings of the article do not make a strong claim, it seems clear that there is room for logical debate in several of the fields of music broadcasting.

Michael Einhorn addresses the precedents, factors, and practices that led to the 2001 motion to amend the monopolistic licensing practices associated with performance rights organizations. Music licensing had grown to a billion dollar industry and two organizations, ASCAP and BMI, controlled 97 percent of American compositions in their catalogs. ASCAP generated a substantial amount of its license revenues from blanket licenses, 45 percent from television and 36 percent from radio. The decree replaced this "all or nothing" policy and allowed broadcasters more competitive substitutes to the previous blanket contracts. In past antitrust litigation, ASCAP's blanket licenses have been upheld because they were considered non-exclusive and its license fees were under the surveillance of the district court. Previous cases could only speculate as to the cost saving benefits that would derive from the injunction of blanket licensing without offering empirical support. Further weakening the argument was the fact that the markups of individual program licenses, in part because of blanket licensing, made the blanket policies seem reasonable.

The new decree is considered an improvement to save shareholders in the broadcast industry considerable amounts through competition. However, the decree also receives criticism for being too optimistic in its assessment of the health of competition in the market for performing rights organizations. ASCAP and BMI do not currently operate under administrative rules that can consistently adjust blanket license fees in response to differing uses of their catalogs. Consequently they lack the financial ability to rely on market-based competition as a means of compensation for all songwriters.

The "Music Copyright FAQ" section of the Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI) website offers insight into both music licensing and the importance of favorable public reception for PROs. This portion of the website contains an overview of BMI's copyright ownership, the basic rights and licenses associated with music copyright, and examples when music licensing is required. The portion on mechanical rights, for example, offers illustrative anecdotes about music copyright. Such as, the music in The Big Chill soundtrack requires a master use license for the use of the original recordings as well as a mechanical license granting the right to record the musical works onto the soundtrack. However, for the soundtrack of the film The Bodyguard in which Whitney Houston sings "I Will Always Love You" by Dolly Parton, it was not necessary to obtain the master use license since Whitney created an original recording of the song. The Bodyguard still needed a synchronization license to use the song in the film, and a mechanical license to produce the song on the soundtrack.

This section also provides up-to-date information on licensing such as the fees for mechanical licensing: 9.1 cents to record songs less than 5 minutes long or 1.75 cents per minute to record songs over 5 minutes. The BMI website as with other PRO sites offers a common sense argument for music performance agreements, why businesses should accept them, and the benefit the program has for music artists. While the site offers an abundance of practical information, it presents a clear bias for performance licensing with no mention of the potential lack legitimacy of copyright exclusion or shortcomings of the business model.