Time to Pay the (Patsy Cline’s estate etc) Musicians, Says AFL-CIO Executive Council

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/03/04/afl-cio-executive-council-time-to-pay-musicians/

by Mike Hall, Mar 4, 2008

When you hear a favorite song over the Internet or on satellite radio, not only do the folks who wrote the music and lyrics get a royalty, but so do the musicians who perform and sing. That seems fair—after all, the musicians are the ones who make the music come to life.

But if you hear that same song on your car radio, or elsewhere on what’s known as “terrestrial radio,” the song writers receive the royalty—but not the musicians. The United States is the only country that denies musicians performance royalties for radio broadcasts.



It’s time to pay the band, says the AFL-CIO Executive Council in a statement adopted at its March 4–6 meeting in San Diego.

Using the legendary, late country singer Patsy Cline as an example of the copyright law’s unfair treatment of performers, the council says the Performance Rights Act (S. 2500 and H.R. 4789) needs to be swiftly enacted. The bill establishes musician’s performance rights for radio broadcasts.

The Executive Council’s statement says:

Because musical compositions enjoyed a performance right from the inception of the Copyright Act, AM/FM radio must pay songwriters for broadcasting recordings of their songs. This is entirely appropriate. But because the sound recording has no performance right, the musicians and vocalists who bring the song to life are not compensated. The greatest jukebox hit of all time, Patsy Cline’s recording of “Crazy,” demonstrates the difference. Willie Nelson receives a royalty every time Patsy Cline’s recording of “Crazy” is played in public because he wrote the music and the lyrics to the song. But Patsy Cline, the Jordanaires and the inimitable session musicians who created the great recording receive nothing, and neither does Decca Records.

Click here to read the entire statement, “Fairness In Radio.”: http://www.aflcio.org/aboutus/thisistheaflcio/ecouncil/ec03042008g.cfm

[MuseRider]

1. Well I say

Hell yes!