Klarinet Archive - Posting 000115.txt from 2010/07

From: Bill Hausmann <bhausmann1@-----.net>
Subj: Re: [kl] Sheet music copyright
Date: Wed, 07 Jul 2010 23:20:54 -0400

At 10:23 AM 7/7/2010, Joseph Wakeling wrote:
>On 07/07/2010 06:15 AM, Bill Hausmann wrote:
> > Have you any experience with how musicals are done? Whether the
> > performers are commercial-for-profit or non-profit does not
> > matter. Copyright is guarded most jealously and vigorously. ALL
> > parts are rental only. There is no such thing as a "study
> > score." They have no incentive to produce such a thing and much
> > DIS-incentive, since some people would see no problem with
> > distributing copies of it for free.
>
>Those would be _publishers_ we are talking about, not theatres? :-)
>
>The theatres _need_ a score. They _need_ piano reductions. They _need_
>parts. It's in their interests to have all available at very little
>cost, so if they can do deals direct with composers such that afterwards
>both can be made freely available, that's a good thing for them. Why
>would they do such a thing? Because if the originating theatre, acting
>as "publisher", gets performance fees, and they also have a benefit in
>access to scores, piano reductions and parts, they have an interest in
>going down this double line -- free distribution of musical material =
>more performances = more fees, but in addition free distribution of
>musical material = more access to interesting new music = reduced cost
>of production.
>
>Existing publishers might lose, but the two strands of creative artistry
>-- composers and performers/performing institutions, benefit.
>
>I'm not convinced it'd work, but I don't think it's as daft or
>impossible as you make out. I won't defend it further though. It's a
>throwaway idea (I hope someone makes something of it).

There are exceptions, but , in the main, theaters do not commission
and develop their own works. PRODUCERS do, with the assistance of
writers, composers, directors, actors, etc. They RENT a theater to
perform the work in. Some, like Rodgers and Hammerstein, formed a
company to publish their own work. Others hire people to do
it. Producers do shows to make money, and they need to make a LOT of
money on their hits to cover the extensive losses on the flops. The
overhead involved in producing a musical is ENORMOUS. (I recently
finished reading a biography of Hal Prince.)

Bill Hausmann

If you have to mic a saxophone, the rest of the band is TOO LOUD!

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