At 11:11 AM Sunday 12/25/2005, Robert G. Seeberger wrote:
http://tinyurl.com/be36r
STRICT copyright officials banned guitar shop customers from playing
classic riffs like Led Zeppelin's Stairway To Heaven - just like in
the film, Wayne's World.
The Performing Right Society (PRS) told Regent Guitars in Leamington
it would need to buy a licence if customers wanted to strum famous
tunes to ensure songwriters were paid royalties.
Richard Cholerton, aged 33, owner of the Regent Street shop, said he
was shocked when he got a phone call informing him of the regulations.
He said: "A call came through from the PRS asking me if I had
customers coming in and playing guitars.
"I said sometimes they might play well-known pieces such as Stairway
and he said 'you need a licence'.
"I was flabbergasted. I thought it was a hoax; somebody winding me up.
"We are talking about beginners trying a few chords on an instrument
before they buy it - these are not performances in front of people
clapping and cheering."
The shop has produced two tongue-in-cheek posters to ask customers not
to play Stairway or Deep Purple's Smoke on the Water for fear of
upsetting the PRS.
PRS bosses said it was important songwriters got paid if shops and
other organisations played their music, but today admitted they had
got it wrong in this case.
Spokesman Adrian Crookes said: "If that is all that is happening in
music shops, and they are not having performances, then no licence is
needed. I think we hold our hands up to that and say we were slightly
overzealous.
"But if music is used in a way to improve a business, is it not fair
that the musician who wrote it is not paid as a thank you?
"There is a top tier but the vast majority of PRS members earn less
than £10,000 a year from royalties."
The PRS is a non-profit-making organisation with around 44,000 members
consisting of composers, songwriters, authors and publishers of music.
xponent
Reprise Maru
rob
Two observations:
(1) I doubt that the majority of people coming
into a music store try out a riff written by one
of those songwriters who make less from writing
music than they would flipping burgers because
it's unlikely that many would have heard anything
written by the latter (otherwise they would
probably be making more). Perhaps the most
likely exception would be the guy whose song just
made it big and he decided to renew himself with
a new guitar and so tried it out with his own music . . .
(2) I doubt Mr Crookes or the other members of
the PRS are as much interested in the low-paid
songwriters getting their share, or even the
members of Led Zepplin getting their share, as
they are in the members of the PRS and others who
make a living off the artists' talent getting their lion's share . . .
Greed Maru
--Ronn! :)
"Since I was a small boy, two states have been
added to our country and two words have been
added to the pledge of Allegiance... UNDER
GOD. Wouldn't it be a pity if someone said that
is a prayer and that would be eliminated from schools too?"
-- Red Skelton
(Someone asked me to change my .sig quote back, so I did.)
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