Blog #8

Only in America: The Unique Status of Sound Recordings under U.S. Copyright Law and How It Threatens Our Audio Heritage.

This article interests me greatly as I can relate it to one of my Bibliography articles regarding Whistling as a human imitation through the use of sound recording. As I have learned already, sound recording is an irreplaceable part of the historical record. People of all walks of life including celebrities, artists, whistlers, and different cultures have recorded sounds throughout the past century. The United States is a rare exception, in that it requires permission for anyone to hear these recordings as it is defending and holding the ‘rights’ of the creators. I found it interesting that property rights of sound recordings hold a higher standard than any other property (within my opinion solely, perhaps with exception, the literal property that someone owns/occupies.) In fact, recordings made prior to 1972 hold even harsher restrictions. This is due to the 1976 Copyright laws and justly defended due to the increase of internet usage recently. Interesting to read that there was a case against Naxos regarding a foreign classical recording that happened in the 1930’s! Surely the composer is still not alive..Even the Library of Congress has few sound recordings. In my opinion these laws need to be changed or even eradicated. The least reissued genre was ethnic music, the music of minorities and foreign-language immigrant groups. I wonder if this is a representation and result of another case of racially discriminated laws put into place whether directly or indirectly. What I find more repulsive, is the fact that there is clearly a demand for these historical recordings. It seems that money, and censorship are the two main reasons for copyright laws.

As someone who is a stronger believer and defender of property rights, I still am unsure how intellectual property falls into these rights. I have a feeling that even after continuing to read and learn more on the subject, I still will not have a definitive answer. I just feel that if someone is blatantly going to use material from someone else, they should rightly give credit to that person. I found a lot of the material to be repetitive to the earlier readings done in the semester, however, it is a good refresher as we are in the crux of writing and citing our bibliographies. The conclusion of this article mentions that some responsibility and blame should be put on the community. I agree wholeheartedly; it’s often easier to blame the for-profit corporations, government, and media. However, all three are a direct reflection of the people. So in conclusion, people need to step up, speak up, and defend their rights.

How Streaming Media Could Threaten the Mission of Libraries

This article starts off by mentioning how difficult it was to try and borrow and lend Dudamel’s recording of Symphonie Fantastique, only being available by digital download. After going through about 4 different venues, it would be allowed but for a pretty penny. This process demonstrates content licensing. In fact, the fee that the publishers were asking for was so high, that I initially wondered if it was a predatory publishing site. The licensing of digital media differs from that of old-fashioned in that publishers can rent out and sell permission to access instead of allowing the buyer full rights of copying. What I found funny was not the inability for librarians to access media, but how they were offered a grant to study the effects, along with not being able to rightly access media. Downloading will soon be a thing of the past, because of the current trend of accessing files thorough such outlets at Spotify and Rdio.

Belfer Audio Archive

The Belfer Audio Archive was founded in 1963 with over 150,000 recordings. It can play back all of these archives, performing preservation, digitization, and work on fixing aging recordings. Pretty cool that it is part of Syracuse University. Some of these files include digital audio tapes, wires, tape reels, and cassettes. I enjoy that there are collections that you can search for also. Some of the non-musicians’ recordings that I would like to get my hands on are from Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein. There are tips on the website how to search for files. Summon allows for a more broad search. Students in the Music Industry program at SU learn the process of studio recording with digital equipment in the Live End/Dead End room. I also enjoy the weekly blogs in Sound Beat. I listened to the granddaughter of Woodie Guthrie, Beethoven and his relationship to Napolean, and 12^th Street Rag (an edition I’ve been trying to ILL for trombone ensemble) for example. I like how they include the audio written below for those of us with comprehension problems. Here are some of my favorite recordings I found on the cylinder collection:

http://digilib.syr.edu/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/cylinder&CISOPTR=533&CISOBOX=1&REC=6

http://digilib.syr.edu/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/cylinder&CISOPTR=450&CISOBOX=1&REC=1

National Jukebox

The National Jukebox is the official name of the site of the Library of Congress. It includes a search icon, digital collections, catalogs, and librarians to answer any questions. These recordings are offered to the public free of charge. On the front page, what I noticed most interesting, is it lets you know what will be added to the website soon. I typed in ‘trombone’ and found Arthur Pryor’s recordings of solo pieces that I currently am working on. I like the fact that when I searched for trombone and whistling, I found more recordings on this site than Belfer. Belfer had better resources for listening to brief audio recordings.