Copyright

If you are planning to make a recording for sale, you may have to deal with copyright issues. The general rule governing the expiry of copyright for musical works is as follows:

The protective length of copyright for a musical work is the life of the author plus a period of 70 calendar years from the end of the calendar year in which the author dies.

This means that for work to be free from copyright in the year 2007, a composer must have died during the year 1936 (70 complete years after the end of the year in which they died).

We can arrange copyright licence payments and add them to your bill if you wish. These are generally nominal and worth paying rather than running the risk of prosecution! For more information visit the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society website.