 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: duxburyclarinetguy
Date: 2008-04-28 14:24
I am a former student of Harold Wright and after his death was given some of his music (scores, studies etc as well as some that belonged Ralph McLean (autographed). Would they be of interest to anyone if I had them copied and made available?
Post Edited (2008-04-28 14:25)
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2008-04-28 14:31
While the annotations would be well received, the music MIGHT be copyrighted.
Maybe Mark could weigh in on the matter.
Otherwise, some pdf files would be coveted by all.
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2008-04-28 15:18
Alseg wrote:
> While the annotations would be well received, the music MIGHT
> be copyrighted.
> Maybe Mark could weigh in on the matter.
US Copyright laws allow short excerpts to be used for scholarly study (fair use), so if a measure or 2 with annotations were used I don't think there'd be a US Copyright violation.
I am not a lawyer, however, and could only contribute to a legal defense fund ...
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2008-04-28 16:06
Wright's annotations would certainly be copyrightable.
Note that a number of public domain scores with Wright's annotations are already available, including the Mozart Trio and Quintet, the Beethoven Septet and Trio, the Weber Quintet, the Schubert Octet, the Schumann Märchenerzählungen and the Brahms Trio and Quintet. See http://www.vcisinc.com/clarinetmusiccollections.htm, item C091. You might get in touch with Ethan Sloane, who's named as the editor, or Southern Music, the publisher, to find out what they did about copyrights.
If your scores have anything not in the Sloane book, or if the markings are different from what appear there, I'd certainly be interested. Also the McLane material.
Kalmen Opperman told me that Ralph McLane used a number of spellings for his last name. McLane is the most common one, but McLean appears often.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Alseg
Date: 2008-04-28 16:10
If the notations are anything like the Sloane books, they would be very valuable musically. They are of great help.
Former creator of CUSTOM CLARINET TUNING BARRELS by DR. ALLAN SEGAL
-Where the Sound Matters Most(tm)-
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2008-04-28 16:11
Ken Shaw wrote:
> Wright's annotations would certainly be copyrightable.
Curiosity, Ken ...
Since the original manuscripts were given to duxburyclarinetguy, could McLane's estate have any claim on them?
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Author: crnichols
Date: 2008-04-28 16:48
I'd love to have a look at that stuff...
Christopher Nichols, D.M.A.
Assistant Professor of Clarinet
University of Delaware
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2008-04-28 22:05
Mark -
Markings on music are not copyrightable if they simply say something that's obvious to everyone. The last movement of the Mozart Clarinet Quintet is a theme and variations, as every competent player recognizes immediately. If Mozart had not marked the variations, an editor who simply marked "Variation 1," "Variation 2" etc. wouldn't have done sufficiently creative work to get protection. Likewise, McLane's autograph wouldn't be copyrightable.
However, the Wright markings in the Sloane book go well beyond the obvious, showing phrase shapes and Wright's unique musicianship. This sort of original work on public domain music is copyrightable, as Hyperion found to its dismay and possible bankruptcy.
The owner of an unpublished manuscript can prevent its publication forever. Remember when you had to remove the Winterthur Fragment from woodwind.org. This runs perpetually, at least in New York. (Think of the Naxos litigation over the Menuhin recording of the Elgar Concerto.) Typically the right travels along with the object, and if Wright gave the material to Rick Muraida (duxburyclarinetguy) without reserving any ownership rights (which is undoubtedly what happened), then unless Wright had registered the copyright with the US Copyright Office before that time, Rick owns those rights. The situation is made more complicated by the publication of the Sloane book. If the book reproduces the exact material he gave to Rick, then there could be extensive, expensive litigation about who owns what, on the unlikely assumption that the material is valuable enough to litigate over. (The Hyperion litigation was worth it, since in England, the losing infringer has to pay the winner's attorneys' fees.)
However, the Wright annotations in the Sloane book have been published, so they have lost their perpetual common law copyright and are protected by statutory copyright. Thanks to Disney and Sonny Bono, this is life plus 90 years. I doubt that Wright's estate sold the copyright to Sloane. They probably only granted him a license to use it for that purpose only.
Similarly, if Rick's McLane material is edited music, he would own the right to publish it.
IAAL, but my words are worth what you paid for them. People become lawyers because they love complication and argument. Any competent lawyer could hold forth for hours about a case like this.
Ken Shaw
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2008-04-28 22:47
Ken Shaw wrote:
...
That's what I was thinking. The estate probably holds no rights, and the rest may well be very muddled.
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Author: Keith P
Date: 2008-04-30 19:19
I am interested as well and I know several people outside this board who would be too!
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-04-30 21:54
Ken--
I'm a lawyer, too. Intellectual property is my primary area of practice. I just noticed a couple of things...
The determination as to whether federal or state copyright law applies no longer hinges on whether the work has been published (as it did under the 1919 copyright act). The threshold question under the current act (Copyright Act of 1976) is whether the work has been fixed in a tangible medium (written, recorded, filmed, etc.). There is no common law copyright for something that is written down--only the federal statutory copyright, because the federal copyright completely preempts state rights for works fixed in a tangible medium. The Naxos case you mentioned is an exception to this rule because there is no federal copyright in sound recordings made prior to 1972 (which the recording at issue in that case was).
Also, since ownership of the federal copyright is distinct from ownership in a physical copy (or the original) of the work itself, I don't think that it is safe to assume that Rick owns a copyright interest in Mr. Wright's and Mr. Lane's annotations (in the absence of other facts to the contrary).
Finally, I think you meant to say that the Sonny Bono Act extended the copyright term to 70 years. The old term under the 1976 Act was life+50 (the minimum term under the Berne Convention), and Sonny Bono extended it an additional 20 years, making it 70.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2008-05-01 00:46
Michael -
Thanks very much for the corrections and clarifications.
I didn't mention the bizarre rule about a sound recording not counting as "publication" because I was making a different point: that common law copyright in unpublished material is perpetual. If I had gotten into that, I would have had to lay out a lot more about the Naxos case than anyone but a lawyer would be interested in.
I have no idea where I came up with the 90 year figure. Obviously I should wait for you to answer future copyright questions.
Ken Shaw
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Author: mrn
Date: 2008-05-01 20:08
Ken--
Good point. Common law copyright (where it still exists) is perpetual. In the good old days, you could write a hit a song, sell player piano rolls and records, and keep your common law copyright forever (so long as you didn't publish the sheet music). (That was under the 1909 copyright act--I erroneously referred to it as the 1919 act in my last post)
I must confess that I am pleasantly surprised to find out that you're an attorney. I haven't been reading this board very long, but from the posts of yours that I've read, you seem very knowledgeable about the clarinet. Did you major in music before you went to law school? Do you play professionally or teach in addition to practicing law?
Mike
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Author: arnsas
Date: 2008-05-25 20:49
Greetings:
Mr. MacLean:
I also studied with mr. Wright in 1963 while he was with the National Symphony in Wash. D.C.
In fact I broke the news to him about the shooting of JFK at my music lesson that Friday.
I certainly would be interested in copies of his scores and other documents as you offered.
I was stationed from 1963 through 1988 with the U.S. Navy Band.
Am currently principal clarinetist with (ironically) the Mc Lean Symphony here in Northern Virginia.
Hope to here from you! Best regards, Arnold Saslowsky.
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2008-05-26 14:51
Ken Shaw wrote:
>>...the Wright markings in the Sloane book go well beyond the obvious, showing phrase shapes and Wright's unique musicianship.>>
As you would predict from your knowledge of my stance, Ken, my own view is that those markings, particularly in the Mozart pieces, are actually about as useful to an intelligent peformer as a poke in the eye with a dirty stick -- to adapt a phrase that my father used to use.
(It's interesting to consider the difference with the situation that would obtain if STADLER'S markings on any of his material -- if he ever made any, which I doubt -- were to come to light.)
However, I'd be grateful if you'd describe a few of these markings -- the details of the first few lines of the clarinet parts of a couple of the pieces, for example -- so that I can know the sort of thing that I would be wasting my money on were I to buy the material.
There's a close correspondence here with the situation with Etheridge's book. In fact, on second thoughts, I'd go farther, and say that BOTH that book and this material, if considered seriously by a student, are potentially damaging to their musical development.
Tony
Post Edited (2008-05-26 14:55)
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Author: Old Geezer
Date: 2008-05-26 20:59
Harold Wright is a familiar name...but who's Ralph MacLean. Is or was he a clarinetist too?
Seems to me I've seen some printed clarinet sheet music with annotations by Harold Wright for sale online.
Clarinet Redux
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2008-05-26 21:10
Old Geezer wrote:
> Harold Wright is a familiar name...but who's Ralph MacLean. Is
> or was he a clarinetist too?
You'd have better luck looking up Ralph McLane, though I've seen plenty of variants of his name.
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Author: Bob Phillips
Date: 2008-05-27 15:47
I've had the Ethan Sloane -edited book (Collected Chamber Musid for Clarinet, Southern Music Company B543) for a couple of weeks now and have played through the whole thing. I've also picked up the Sloane (with Ruth Wright) edition of the Brahms 2nd clarinet sonata (Op. 120,No. 2)
I'm somewhat familiar with several of the pieces and I offer these observations.
There is a lot to think about in Wright's markings. Don't expect coaching on every measure; Wright's "help" comes sporadically.
Of major interest is how Wright forms phrases in unexpected ways, noting tiny breaks and "new" ways of grouping notes. It is often not immediately clear to me what he is after.
Another part of Wright's markings seems to concern the uneven scale of his instrument --reminders to raise or lower the pitch of certain notes. Some of this is probably to enhance the harmony, but many of his pitch changes seem to be there to remind him to watch his intonation. When next I play with a group using his warnings, I'll be alert for structural pitch alterations vs the vagaries of my Buffet.
But when it comes, it is extremely thought provoking. In the Mozart Clarinet Quintet (Kv 581), I found much to consider in the Larghetto. Bold stuff.
In the Brahms Sonata, however, there is nothing in the Sloan/Wright/Wright notes that is new to me. But that is because, I've been riding with the Wright/Serkin performance CD in my car for a couple of years and working on the music with my teacher. OH, maybe if I'd had the Sloane edition two years ago, things would have been clearer from the start of my expedition.
I do not thing studying the Wright markings will damage my musicianship (such as it is).
Bob Phillips
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Author: claritoot26
Date: 2008-05-27 20:29
try the International Clarinet Association Research Center at University of Maryland. That's just the kind of stuff they like. Clarinetists would have access to it there, too.
Lori
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