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Legal aspect of sampling: What you should know

found this link on future producers, answered quite a few of my questions about sampling stuff:

http://www.music-law.com/sampling.html

Hope it helps if you had that nagging question

An excellent point to make. Well done.

Actually, this really should be a stickie. Mods?

Not much new info there, but this was unknown to me:

quote:

Sampling can also have tremendous consequences if you have a record contract. Most record contracts have provisions called "Warranties", "Indemnifications" and "Representations". These provisions constitute a promise that you created all the music on your album and an agreement to reimburse the label if it is sued. These same provisions are included in all contracts throughout the entertainment distribution chain. The record company has them with the artist, the distributors with the record company, the record stores with the distributors, and so on. Well, all these warranties point back at the artist who is responsible to everyone else! Therefore, if you violate someone else's copyright, you will be paying all the bills of your record company, distributor and any stores which incur expenses as a result of your infringement. This can run into serious money as you can imagine. You will also be in breach of your record contract. Read your record contract carefully before using any samples.

Damn!

Obviously, if you cut the vocals from another track, you could get in deep shit, but if you are just using simple percussion samples like kicks that you've ripped of other tracks, you're fine. No one can say, "Hey, I used that snare in my song, you must have stolen it from me".

quote:

Originally posted by hey cheggy No one can say, "Hey, I used that snare in my song, you must have stolen it from me".

Well they can- if its distinctive, as opposed to the generic 909/808 samples.
Its happened before- they will call in a sampleologist to determine whether its illegally sampled.

Its no different to sampling a vocal line- just on a lesser scale.Its still breach of copyright. Unlikely to happen- but stranger things have happened in the past. (dj danger mouse being a prime recent example..)

truthfully you can't sample anything...you want to use a sample in your track get the permission from the artist/composer/film company/tv studio whatever just get the permission...might cost a few bucks or hundreds...or you...ah no point in explaining what you can do..you probably already know!

i still don't get what's up with sampling other tracks... just make your own... it's so much more rewarding, you learn much more

although, vocals are a whole new ballpark

interesting.
I wonder how tiesto did for his remix of adagio for strings as it is Tiesto - Adagio for Strings on the album instead of Adagio for Strings (Tiesto Remix).
any1 knows?

Because Adagio For Strings is now in the public domain.

Sort of.

What that means is the original music, as written by the composer, is public domain. Specific arrangements and performances can be copyrighted.

quote:

Originally posted by skytribe Because Adagio For Strings is now in the public domain. Sort of. What that means is the original music, as written by the composer, is public domain. Specific arrangements and performances can be copyrighted.

ok!
but how do i know if the music is in public domain or not ?

Copyright only stands for 50 years after the death of the composer...

quote:

Originally posted by Freak Copyright only stands for 50 years after the death of the composer...

Unless it is shored up by the composers family, I've forgotten the details of this but there is a way to keep copyright.

But in that case Barber's Adagio for Strings is no longer copyrighted.

The safest way is to presume things arn't in the public domain, for instance the Beatles songs will probably never enter the public domain.

if i'm not mistaken you can and are able to use the arrangement(and your own sounds) of a classical tune or other with the 50 year rule even if decendents of the copmposer are alive and kicking and have rights to it. one thing you can not do in this case is sample the actual original song.(got to cjeck my sampling copy right manual for this). I think it also applies in this case to people playing classical tunes on operas and shit with no copyright issues but I'm not sur ejust a thought.

One thing that I have pondered for a long time is about Martin Luther King speeches? to sample or not to sample? I've used one before ina tune and it worked really well( no not "I have a dream")....but the thing is is it copy right or not? I know that in this case it would either be the property of the radio broadcasting company that if they are still around? or the speech writer(if he had one?) i really am confused on this one? Or maybe it belongs to the King family? that sounds more right to me?

If anyone know let me know cause this has been the only sampling query on my mind for years.

Limit Out!

quote:

Originally posted by Limit if i'm not mistaken you can and are able to use the arrangement(and your own sounds) of a classical tune or other with the 50 year rule even if decendents of the copmposer are alive and kicking and have rights to it. one thing you can not do in this case is sample the actual original song.(got to cjeck my sampling copy right manual for this). I think it also applies in this case to people playing classical tunes on operas and shit with no copyright issues but I'm not sur ejust a thought. One thing that I have pondered for a long time is about Martin Luther King speeches? to sample or not to sample? I've used one before ina tune and it worked really well( no not "I have a dream")....but the thing is is it copy right or not? I know that in this case it would either be the property of the radio broadcasting company that if they are still around? or the speech writer(if he had one?) i really am confused on this one? Or maybe it belongs to the King family? that sounds more right to me? If anyone know let me know cause this has been the only sampling query on my mind for years. Limit Out!

Aaah... the google... the King dillema... Here ya go:

http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/n...003-148920.html

Tomorrow marks the 40th anniversary of Martin Luther King's immortal speech on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. I'd like to quote from the speech, but I hesitate to even mention its title, since I leave myself open to a lawsuit.

The King family, you see, holds a copyright on the 1963 speech along with most of MLK's papers, writings, and images.

Publish or use these without permission and you likely will find yourself receiving correspondence from the family's lawyers, which begins: "You have been sued in court."

USA Today discovered this when it reprinted the full text of the "I Have a Drea-" oops, I mean The Famous Speech On The Mall - and was sued for copyright infringement.

Gannett, which owns the paper, settled out of court for $1,700, plus legal fees.

Then CBS, whose cameras captured King delivering the speech live on Aug. 28, 1963, was sued. Its mistake was including excerpts from its archives in its documentary series, "The 20th Century with Mike Wallace."

CBS settled the case before it went to trial.

Harry Hampton, producer of the marvelous series on the civil rights era "Eyes on the Prize" was sued by the Kings, and settled for an amount "under $100,000," according to news accounts.

The King family has said it's protecting the image of the great civil rights leader from hucksters with crass gift shop proposals like refrigerator magnets, MLK ice cream and pocketknives, according to Slate, a Web magazine.

Yet, the family approved "Keep the Dream Alive" personal checks and a "tasteful" King statuette available from the King Center in Atlanta.

Even so, it's hard not to empathize with the King family.

The King children were small when James Earl Ray murdered their father in 1968. King was not a wealthy man. When he won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, he donated the $54,000 prize money to civil rights groups.

Only the most hardened heart would begrudge King's survivors the licensing deal they have with Time Warner, which reaps them about $10 million a year.

Still, the complete commodification of a modern prophet is cheesy.

And, despite son Dexter King's assertion that the Time Warner deal helps spread King's message far and wide through all kinds of media, well, I doubt it. In fact, it works against it.


The family's vigorous enforcement of copyright protections and heavy restrictions on King's personal papers have driven away researchers, writers and scholars who either can't afford or who refuse to pay the royalties the family demands, according to a story published on CNN's Web site.

In a rare interview on the subject, Dexter King told The New York Times: "It has nothing to do with greed. It has to do with the principle if you make a dollar, I should make a dime."

While he's making all those dimes, he should consider this: A quarter million people stood on the Washington mall as King delivered his speech. It was seen live on TV by 80 million Americans. Each January we celebrate Martin Luther King Day and are reminded of his "dream."

And yet, as famous as that event is, most of what King said that day is largely unknown.

If you read King's text, it sends chills not only because of the beauty of phrasing, but also because a lone man speaking truth to mighty power is so biblical.

America would reap the whirlwind, he warned. Revolt is here. A new militancy has emboldened black Americans. Racial injustice must be ended immediately, not gradually.

But today, for a news network to broadcast much more than the old reliable touchy-feely snippets of the 16-minute speech, it will cost money, lest they violate the family's copyright privilege. You want more than a couple of stock lines from the speech? Licensing fees start at $2,000.

If King remains a one-dimensional grainy black-and-white figure who utters the same sunny sound bite year after year until it's a cliche, it's because news networks won't pay for more, and researchers have been kept from delving deep into his papers to tell us something new about the Martin Luther King the man, not the statuette.

And his family wants it that way.

well thats why we have something called "white label"...lol...who did it? well who knows, but it didn't cost shit!

Thanks for clearing that up though...i've been trying to figure that out for years. i used his "******* ****"(ya right..I aint sayin' it) speech in one of my tunes a while back and it was sick,but i scrapped it after considering the financial disfunction of it all..But I might still white label it!

Limit out!

does anyone know anything about synth sampling? making an SF2 sample from sounds that you programmed on your hardware like what these people do:

http://vipzone.time4base.com/index_en.html

did they have to obtain a special liscense or permit from the synth manufacturers to do this?


I want to make an SF2 sample CD with a bunch of sounds that I've programmed on my virus and sell it on ebay.. will Access sue me for doing this?

quote:

Originally posted by alanzo does anyone know anything about synth sampling? making an SF2 sample from sounds that you programmed on your hardware like what these people do: http://vipzone.time4base.com/index_en.html did they have to obtain a special liscense or permit from the synth manufacturers to do this? I want to make an SF2 sample CD with a bunch of sounds that I've programmed on my virus and sell it on ebay.. will Access sue me for doing this?

Whatever you create in hardware synth is royalty-free: that means you own it and can do whatever you want with it. The only exemption to that seem to be ROMplers such as Atmosphere. Meaning - you can't take their bank and sell it separately, however, you can take the individual patch, sample it and make your own soundbank.

The only rights that hardware manufacturers have are to the contents inside the box - e.g if you were to take apart the synth, reverse engineer their DSP's or other proprietary stuff then you'd be in trouble. There was actually a precedent mentioned in Access Virus programming tutorial (first few pages - something about ARP 2600) - can't recall.

Anywho, rock on and have fun.

yay.. now I might have enough to pay for books next year at college.. literally.. oiii

thanks.. i'll post a thread on TA about it when i finish it..

quote:

Originally posted by _Marco_ interesting. I wonder how tiesto did for his remix of adagio for strings as it is Tiesto - Adagio for Strings on the album instead of Adagio for Strings (Tiesto Remix). any1 knows?

Martin Roth - The Orange Theme
why its not cygnus x (martin roth mix)?
50 year rule doesnt apply

does this mean I can re-make "Adagio For Strings" and call it Subtle - Adagio For Strings release it, and make loads of money? :P

unless im mistaken you probly could just would have to make your own arrangement and remake it. i think doing such a thing is quite stupid as it doesnt give respects to the orginal composer. if you ever released it tho youd have to have credit to the composer in the fine print. might be wrong but i belive thats how it works if i rember classical music correctly

What about VSTi's and stuff like that?
Are there some out there which say you can produce the sounds with it, but cannot release it?

An how about settings like appregiators that some one has allready made, like Up/Down/ Up-Down......

quote:

Originally posted by Johann84 What about VSTi's and stuff like that? Are there some out there which say you can produce the sounds with it, but cannot release it? An how about settings like appregiators that some one has allready made, like Up/Down/ Up-Down......

It's rather simple to figure out. There's only very limited number of copyrighted stuff, when it comes to equipment/sounds.

As an example, let's say you take something like Atmosphere - create bunch of sounds from existing ROM LIBRARY. The moment you tweak the parameter, even by one notch, it's not original anymore and can be considered as your own work. The only thing you cannot do is reverse engineer the product to extract the sounds. They'd have to prove you did it too.

Arp patterns are yours, no matter what. If arp patterns were copyrighted, trance wouldn't exist, as crapload of songs contain the same friggin arp pattern. Now, the flip side of that is if you take something recognizable, like Armin's "Communication" pattern (with matching notes and melody), recorded it in your track and then claimed it as your own - that would be a problem. As far as the pattern itself - you're clear.

Interestingly enough, the only exemption I can think of is roland produced a soundcard for their XP/JV series which was used on some of the tracks that later became copyrighted by some big name musician. Somehow, Roland lost the fight and had to pull the card from the market. THe card now (however worthless it is for its sounds) fetches about 2x the average price of other "regular" Roland XP/JV cards.

Oh, one more thing you can't do is use "demo" songs and claim them as yours. Korg Triton Studio has "Midnight Sun" track which is sooooo sweet, I'd love to use parts of it in my productions. But you can't, coz' its a copyrighted demo.

hope this helps.

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