Re: Needletime / Pay for Play

On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Paul Geller <pgeller[_at_]law.usc.edu> wrote:
>
> On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, Mike Holderness <mch[_at_]cix.compulink.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > On Mon, 19 Jul 1999, Bradley Silver <bradleys[_at_]wwb.co.za> wrote:
> > >
> > > How has the performance right in a sound recording (needletime)
> > > come to include performers' rights to receive a percentage of the
> > > appropriate royalty for the broadcast of the sound recording?
> >
> > Surely because in the _droit d'auteur_ tradition -- which is, after
> > all, the mainstream -- artists, including performers, have
> > *inalienable* rights in their work.
>
> To start, distinguish between (a) the author's right in his or her
> work, (b) the performer's right in his or her performance, and
> (c) the producer's right in its recording. To illustrate, consider
> a Beethoven sonata: Beethoven cannot assert his rights any more, but
> the pianist and record company can assert theirs in their (recent)
> recording. For their rights in broadcasting, see the Rome Convention,
> art. 12. Do not get confused by the nomenclature or the alienability
> issues.

I understood Bradley's question to be about history & causes. It seemed to be based on the axiom "copyright is a property right", possibly expressing doubt about performers having rights in a work "owned by" a producer. The distinction between copyright & authors' rights is -- especially in this context -- more fundamental than a matter of "nomenclature".

--
Mike Holderness
  http://www.poptel.org.uk/nuj/mike/
  <mch[_at_]cix.compulink.co.uk>