Copyright Laws for Musicians

Copyrights laws are a vital aspect of the music industry. Any person seeking to have success in the music industry should have a clear understanding of what copyright laws protect, how to avoid infringement, and how to recognize if your work has been infringed. Once a work is created, the creator is the rightful owner; however, until the work is register the owner is not fully protected by copyright laws. My goal in this blog is to give readers the basic knowledge of copyright laws that can be built upon with further research. There is a current copyright infringement case, The Estate of Randy Wolfe vs. Led Zeppelin, I will discuss briefly; however, I would like to discuss what copyright laws protect.

            In essence, copyright laws protect the authorship of an original work. Any original work that is fixed in a tangible medium such as: lyric sheets, sound recordings, or poetry written on paper, can be protected by copyright laws. The term intellectual property is often used in the industry. Intellectual Property or Ip is just way to say creative idea. Copyright laws give the owner of a fixed work a limited duration monopoly, which in turns give the owner five exclusive rights. The five exclusive rights that an owner of a copyright has are: the right to reproduce, perform, display in public, make derivatives (remix), and distribute. Copyright laws do not protect ideas, names, titles, works in the public domain and trademarks. The life of a copyright will last, life plus seventy years after death of owner, or ninety-five years or one hundred and twenty years, which ever is least, after publication, for a work for hire. There are a few other Ip’s that copyright laws protect which are not directly related to music, as there are a few items that are not listed which copyright laws do not protect. My goal is to apply information that a musician can readily begin to apply.

            Copyright infringement occurs when a person or the estate of someone that has died feels that a protected work was used without permission. In order to establish a case of copyright infringement, the plaintiff, must prove ownership and registration to the work, must prove the alleged person had access to the work, and the plaintiff must prove one of the exclusive right was violated or a similar work was made.

            This pass spring, the estate of Randy Wolfe filled a copyright infringement suite against Led Zeppelin. The claim alleges that the song “Stairway to Heaven” is similar to the song “Taurus” a work of Randy Wolfe’s band. In any copyright infringement case, it is up to the plaintiff to prove the elements of infringement. In this particular case, the estate of Randy Wolfe will have to prove the ownership of the song “Taurus”. The plaintiff will also have to prove that Led Zeppelin had access to the song. According to CNN, the estate of Randy Wolfe alleges that Led Zeppelin guitarist became familiar with Wolfe’s band catalog while on tour. After establishing the first two elements, the plaintiff will have to prove that the works of the two songs are similar. If the case is decided in favor of the plaintiff, Randy Wolfe’ estate will be compensated for damages. This is a brief summary of the case of The Estate of Randy Wolfe vs. Led Zeppelin. While we examine this case we can see the importance of protecting IP, and ways copyright infringement can develop.

            I hope the information in this post is helpful. We as musicians have a responsibility to understand our rights. We also have the reasonability to protect our creative works.

~LT