Legal Question in Intellectual Property in California

copyright protection for classical music

Hello,

I am interested in setting up a classical music server at my college using the cd’s the college library currently owns. As opposed to the current setup, where students might keep a highly desired cd for two months, I’d like to setup a computer server which can stream the music to current students. I was wondering if this is legal. There is a service that we currently use call the Naxos music library which does this as well, but that costs a monthly fee and limits the number of users listening. I was also wondering if it would be legal to do this for other colleges, linking their library to ours since they have interlibrary loan, can they stream the music to us other as long as they own the music, and since we could get it loaned anyways?

Also, considering the copyright of classical music has ended for probably all the cd’s (its been well over the 50 or 75 years) what protections are granted to an orchestra that records a piece by, for example, Mozart today? Or are the legal issues removed when it is for music such as that? Is a cd that is recorded today of a piece with an expired copyright get another 75 years?

Thank you for the help.


Asked on 5/02/05, 8:05 pm

1 Answer from Attorneys
Philip Iadevaia Law Offices of Philip A. Iadevaia

Re: copyright protection for classical music

You might try to see if anyone has purchased the catalogue of that music so you can safely license it for use. If no one owns the copyrights to the music, your recordation of it is a rendition that could be copyrighted, but the music itself cannot.

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Answered on 5/03/05, 10:58 am


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