NEW COPYRIGHT BILL.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20917, 6 January 1930, Page 3

NEW COPYRIGHT BILL.

COMPOSER’S PROTEST,

(From Our Own Correspondent.)

n LONDON, November 26. Composers have a grievance against the Musical Copyright Bill which was brought forward for second reading m the House or Commons last Friday. Many well-known composers have signed a protest m which they say;—

At all times. With few exceptions, earning a precarious livelihood, they (the composers) have been hard hit during fby the damaging effects of the gramophone and broadcasting upou the sale of printed copies of their music; a hardship intensified by the legal fixin-.-of the composer’s royalty on gramophone discs at an entirely inadequate figure. The Bill, if proceeded with, would deprive the composer of the benefit of the last remaining effective source of his income, his performing rights. * s P r °P°® ec l that by paying the ridiculous sum of twopence to cover those rights (of which sum the publisher would naturally take a share) the purchaser of a piece of copyright music would be at liberty to perform that music in public. al ?., a PP ar ently as often as he pleased, while it was in his possession. “ What, indeed, would there be to prevent unscrupulous person from passing on his copy to someone else, when his own purposes were served? n -A- 8 one of the speakers against the ■Dili pertinently inquired—are Bernard Shaw, Barrie. Galsworthy, and the rest of the playwrights whose work is issue! in printed form, to be required in their turn to deliver the right of public performance of their plays to any chance purchaser, on similar terms. - ’