Can anyone help me with a performing rights issue ? I'm confused!

Sir

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Hi all. (not sure I'm in the right place, but here goes anyway. Sorry it's going to be quite long)

One of the students in my school sadly passed away last week. She'd been very poorly for some time, and before she died, she managed to raise thousands of pounds for charities that support terminally ill children.

We got together a group of staff and students to decide what we could do in her memory to carry on raising money for her charities.

Someone mentioned the brilliant version of Somewhere over the rainbow you guys did in memory of the captain, and the general feeling was that we should make our own version of that arrangement (but not a video)

We did a rough cut to see if could work and I think it will.

The thing is, I've been given conflicting advice on how we proceed from here if we wanted to sell the mp3 from our school's website.

Do we need permission from the copyright holders of the two different songs?
Do we need permission from the arranger (ie Iz's record company)? (I've contacted mountain apple company, but had no response.. yet)
Do I just sod it and record somewhere under the rainbow :D

The performing rights society in the UK say we'll need to apply to them for a license to sell the recording, but we'll need permission from composer/arranger before we can apply.

I want to do it right, but I've already lost a morning getting this far (which doesn't feel very far at all) :confused:

You guys got any ideas?
 
The PRS "Limited Manufacture Licence" seems to cover eveything you need, so long as you are selling direct to "family and friends" and not via third parties such as shops.

This is the link:

http://www.prsformusic.com/users/musicforproducts/LM/Pages/LM.aspx

Hi Chris, thanks for your reply. The nice lady at the PRS told me I had to get permission before I get anywhere near them. LIsa Soong from Big Apple Mountain records has been in touch to let me know that it is EMI who hold the publishing rights to the arrangement.

We're not going to be covered on the manufacture licence as we're going to be selling it as a digital download, apparently I need the online version.

Has anyone ever sought out EMI's permission to do anything? Will corporate America care about a tiny English project that may raise a few hundred pounds?
 
I don't know what issues relate to the UK, but you should check out the Harry Fox Agency. They will clear the publishing rights for use in recording the cover for a song. If you are going totally legit, you essentially owe 9.1 American cents per sale to the rights holder. You can fill out all the approriate forms and paperwork online.

http://www.harryfox.com/index.jsp

and specifically for limited production:
http://www.harryfox.com/public/songfile.jsp

And for great information check out this from CDBaby:
https://roguepost.backpackit.com/pub/1959516-cover-songs

Again, most of this is written with US in mind. Not sure what process is in UK. Maybe you can update us as you discover!
 
Hi Chris, thanks for your reply. The nice lady at the PRS told me I had to get permission before I get anywhere near them. LIsa Soong from Big Apple Mountain records has been in touch to let me know that it is EMI who hold the publishing rights to the arrangement.

We're not going to be covered on the manufacture licence as we're going to be selling it as a digital download, apparently I need the online version.

Has anyone ever sought out EMI's permission to do anything? Will corporate America care about a tiny English project that may raise a few hundred pounds?

Digital download is very complex legally because it's available everywhere in the world.

EMI is a UK company, so if they own the *world-wide* rights then you might do OK talking to them. They seem to understand online better than most record companies.

As this is raising funds for charity, you might consider ringing their PR people first to explain the project. A deal under which you get free right to record and distribute, in return for EMI using that fact for corporate image work, might be a nice deal all round. Usually there are links to the PR contact on any large company's website.
 
Digital download is very complex legally because it's available everywhere in the world.

EMI is a UK company, so if they own the *world-wide* rights then you might do OK talking to them. They seem to understand online better than most record companies.

As this is raising funds for charity, you might consider ringing their PR people first to explain the project. A deal under which you get free right to record and distribute, in return for EMI using that fact for corporate image work, might be a nice deal all round. Usually there are links to the PR contact on any large company's website.

Chris, you absolute genius! I'd never thought of that!

EMI's PR people will be getting a phone call tomorrow!
 
GNARRGH!!!! :mad::confused::(

After a phone call to EMI in London, and being passed through 7 departments (although that's not strictly true because I went back to one dept 3 times) I finally landed with a young lady who said she could help as she could send the form I needed to me via email straight away.

She did!

It's just that the form in question was a generic "if you are fat boy slim's agent and he needs to sample and obscure middle 8 from a 1956 hit, fill this box in" type form. I had to make up a record label to fill one box. The box that said "leave as much information as possible" wasn't expandable so you could only use 20 words.

The accompanying email said "be prepared, you may well be refused permission"

I emailed the nice young lady to tell her the form didn't seem to meet our particular request. - No reply.
I re-emailed the nice young lady including our recording (to prove why our request wasn't met by the form) - No reply.
So I filled in the form (making up the bits that were meant for publishing houses) sent it with our recording and asking the nice young lady if there was anything else I could do to support our application (as it was a bit unusual?) - No reply.

Now I might be wrong, the EMI execs may be (as we speak) poring over my application, arguing the finer points of copyright law and maybe even listening to the track to see if it's worthy. they might even be writing the speech I have to give at next years' Ivor Novello awards for best rip off of a recording artist?

Or the nice young lady might have pressed delete.
:confused:
 
I say release the recording then call the papers when the big bad record execs are taking the small charity organization to court.
 
I say release the recording then call the papers when the big bad record execs are taking the small charity organization to court.

:D:D:D:D

Now that would be interesting woudn't it?
 
I say release the recording then call the papers when the big bad record execs are taking the small charity organization to court.

I completely go with robo's idea! No kiddin.

About the copyrights: I had some trouble with WMG because of copyright issues and then talked to the Cooperative Society of Music Authors and Publishers in Switzerland. Two of their managers told me that if someone records a cover song and sells it, they don't need to get permission to record that song, as long as royalties are payed to the copyright owners. For instance, if you decide to sell it over iTunes, it's absolutely no problem. When you upload it onto the platform, you'll be asked the name of the composer, writer, and publisher. With that, royalties can be distributed and no one missed out on their share.

Important: If you change the arrangement of the song, the lyrics, make a parody out of it and so on, you will need a permission, though.

This is how it works here in Switzerland and I'm quite sure it's the same in the UK.
 
I completely go with robo's idea! No kiddin.

About the copyrights: I had some trouble with WMG because of copyright issues and then talked to the Cooperative Society of Music Authors and Publishers in Switzerland. Two of their managers told me that if someone records a cover song and sells it, they don't need to get permission to record that song, as long as royalties are payed to the copyright owners. For instance, if you decide to sell it over iTunes, it's absolutely no problem. When you upload it onto the platform, you'll be asked the name of the composer, writer, and publisher. With that, royalties can be distributed and no one missed out on their share.

Important: If you change the arrangement of the song, the lyrics, make a parody out of it and so on, you will need a permission, though.

This is how it works here in Switzerland and I'm quite sure it's the same in the UK.
:eek:

Seriously ?? We've done a faithful rendition of Iz's arrangement. How do I check that you're right (Why didn't EMI and the PRS didn't tell me this?)

Sebi, if you're right that'd be fantastic!

I'll let you know how I get on.
 
Hi,
Sebi is correct, and I'm suprised PRS didn't tell you this, I spent hours on the phone with them making sure I was doing everything legally...

My duo The Re-entrants have released 3 albums of covers, and they're all on iTunes, too. We looked into this long and hard, and found that you do not need to ask permission (as long as you are not altering the song or making a parody), and that the easiest route to selling online is via CD Baby (and iTunes if you wish). All you need too do is to fill in form AP2 on the MCPS website, and when you get your license (which you will have to pay for, based on the number of songs and the intended selling price) you can go ahead and make and sell CDs. If you then submit your CD to CD Baby, they ask you for all the witer/publisher info from the form and have a blanket deal with the appropriate agencies to deal with all that for you. iTunes do, too, and so you can ask CD Baby to then submit to iTunes (but make sure you let them know it's only for iTunes, not any other download sites), and again you no longer have to worry about anything, they will do it all for you. Hope this helps, let me know if you need any more help.
 
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just do it...

I think it'll sort itself out after the fact. They'll send you a warning, you'll explain ONCE AGAIN your position stating you would gladly purchase licensing if they properly guide you, However, if they pursue litigation, you'll run to the media and tarnish their name since its a charity for terminally ill children.

Geeeeeesh, who would dare sue someone trying to benefit TERMINALLY ILL CHILDREN...especially when you are willing to purchase licensing but are getting no help from the very people able to give it.
 
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