but if oyu're in the US, then yes, legally you need permission for every piece of music. And good luck. :)

So, I guess now would be a good time to bust out Acid and sync up some beats to match the dance moves per each song and politely explain to the couple that it is illegal in all 50 states to distribute copyrighted music without permission for each and every song played at your reception. Then I would further need to explain that if they obtained permission I would resync the original music to the Reception portion of the video. I am glad that I don't film a lot of weddings that have dancing at the reception. Wow!

j razz

Yup it is a joke really.

I had a number of projects I did for non-profit groups and called BMI, ASCAP, The RIAA, Sony BMG, the actual artists etc., not a single major label or licensing company will license music for non-profit use and the artists (as much as they want to) cannot go against their licensing association.

I ended up with a combination of Digital Juice, Acid tracks and Royalty Free resellers.

Duncan

Take a look through this thread

My guess is that very few wedding videographers care about or even bother trying to obtain copyright permission. They just do it and don't worry about it.

Take a look at some of the on line sites for services such as weddings, tribute videos, etc. A lot of them list several popular songs for the customer to choose from.

There was an article in one of the trade mags very recently (Event DV?) that profiled a woman who does yearbook videos for area high schools. She stated that a large part of her success was using whatever the current hit music was as that's what kept the students interested. No mention of copyright concerns whatsoever.

Mike

I would like to know why label or licensing companies don't want to license music for non-profits. I was going to do something for a local rescue ministry where I volunteer, and I called for a sync license...the guy there wanted to know exactly what I was going to do, so I explained everything in an email....never heard from him again. I tried to contact him again and no response. I really didn't understand until now...reading these posts...but I still don't understand why. What's the problem with allowing a non-proft to use a song? Thanks, Tara

And it's the few people who worry like us who loose out. :)

i'm doing a wedding in 5/6 months & talked to the groom tonight & told him about the legal music thing. Him & his future bride are more concerned about their first dance music wise.

I wonder if someone who got "caught" using copyrighted music from a wedding (or other event) that they didn't play ever sued the music label for infringing on their priviate property. IE the camera mic. :) That could be a pretty good laugh of a lawsuit: "It doesn't matter if I was taping, your sound waves penetrated MY microphone without MY permission."

Kind of the same thing with seeing porn video's through someone's car window on their portable DVD player or something along those lines. :)

According to BMI and ASCAP it is simply their stated policy.

In my opinion it is a volume thing and they simply don't want the hassle for a one-off.

The only way they will license to a standard corporation is through annual blanket licensing for the number of employees for the company or for the specific region that the product will be view/consumed.

They simply don't seem to want to do any work on their end as far as unique pricing for smaller projects. Quite frankly it pisses many of the artists off as it costs them money but they (artists) don't want to buck the system for some reason and won't grant a license even though they would like to. For example; I contacted James Taylor and Eric Johnson direct and both were appreciative and understanding but indicated they could not grant a license due to contract issues. The client was willing to pay a couple thousand dollars for a run of about 250 DVDs but BMI would not go against policy.

Duncan

I'll try to find it, but I read recently that (in legal terms) a non-reply to a direct query such as yours, Tara, was the same thing as granting permission. That's not legal advice, mind you. I'll try to find the article and post a link to it.

Jay, I would love to see that article. I respectfully submit that the exact opposite is true. I believe their business model is such that if you ask for permission, and they don't respond, it's the same as saying no.

Dave, I'm looking for it now. The jest was: when a person has chosen not to exercise/enforce his legal rights he is, in essence, saying to the other person "do as you wish, I don't care, one way or the other."

i don't think it's technically legal (if you said "steve, can i run your car in to the river? No answer? Ok, I will!").

I DO remember seeing an interview on "The Screensavers" on TechTV with someone from a non-profit group who wanted to change the copyright laws to something simular that, but not to grant easier permission but because there's lots of owners who aren't able to be contacted because copyright records were out of date. I belive it was sugested that each two years the copyright must be re-applied for (with a simpilar form) & it costs $1. This would force owners to keep their info current. If you didn't care anymore then you just didn't re-apply.

It was also sugested reducing the years a copyright lasts closer to it's origional level (was 20 years I belive, they wanted it ~30-40) so that things enter the public domain longer, but obiviously companies are against this (disney & microsoft, for example, would loose all their brandname stuff to public domain)

The jest was: when a person has chosen not to exercise/enforce his legal rights he is, in essence, saying to the other person "do as you wish, I don't care, one way or the other."

Kinda like Trade Mark? If the owner doesn't defend its misuse, it falls out of protected status?

Ah-ah-ah-choo! Pass me a kleenex, please.

There are provisions under some laws that do have that effect, for example when winding up a company or executing a will, public notices etc give a fixed time period for all claims to be submitted.
Just how that would work for copyright matters I cannot say, I have heard it seriously suggested that if you had made all reasonable efforts to contact the owners (registered letters, legal notices etc) then one could perhaps, maybe use that as a legal defense that you had made ever possible effort to respect the rights of the copyright holders. Somehow I don't thing an unanswered email would hold much weight, especially when clearly the copyright owners are very much alive and kicking, they just don't want to talk to YOU and why should the law force them to?
Bob.

As you might expect, I can't find the darn thing! It wasn't on copyright law, it was about contract law in general and enforcing specific provisions or failing to and the consequences of not doing so.

I will keep looking!

Seems to me another end of the stick may have some say. If your at a party or wedding recording a video. Yor triing to capture the event and the people. Them talking and singing, just having a good time. If the music is drowning them out then this is an invasion of your space as you were invited to film the event, So the person playing the music and the artist may be sued accordinly also. BS right? Seems as if we have muddy up the freedom of speech so bad, were is the end? In most cities in the US, a loud boom box in a car can be fine for disturbing the peace. Fine the guy and who ever made the boom box.. Who's rights come frist the companies or the people? If your invited or hired, your there to record a piece of history in these peoples lifes, thats the main issue. So what ever else is present is not the responsibility of of the person doing the recording. Nothing offensive about it not like a pron shots in the back ground. After all you did not get permission of everyone at the wedding to be on the film.. Some common sence needs the attenion on these matters.

I've read many of these threads over the past year with interest....I don't film weddings but I'm curious if anyone knows what advice (if any) WEVA gives members re: copyright issues.

I've looked at the WEVA site but never found anything....figured it was a benefit included with membership??....

kb

:)

I've never seen weva come out with an official stand. I have seen lots of contest winners using well-known hit songs.

With respect to music played at the reception, I would think the first line of defense would be the DJ (he played it, I just picked up the "ambient" sound with my camera). But I bet DJ's (in USA) don't attempt to get permission.

Several years ago, before I joined WEVA, I asked them this very question. Their response in brief was as follows:

It's a grey area of the law, and the studios know this is going on and haven't stopped it; and in particular, no wedding videographer in the history of the industry has ever been sued for use of copyrighted music.

Personally I don't see where selling a DVD with copyrighted music on it, without artist/publisher permission, is allowed by US copyright law so I don't know what they mean by "grey area". But as far as I can tell with some brief online searches, their last statement (no wedding videographer has ever been sued for music copyright infringement) is correct. Video recording the couple's first dance along with whatever pop tune they choose has been standard practice for videographers for at least a decade, so my guess is the wedding market seems like a "small infringer" to the big corps.

Note- according to the below link, the RIAA did sue Amway in 1996, along with their videographer, for some blatant copyright violations in a sales video that was distributed nationwide, and RIAA got over $13 million (!) in a settlement. http://www.amquix.info/aus/riaa.htm

The DJ may or may not be using the music legally. It is possible to get a performing rights license via ASCAP, BMI etc. and if so, the DJ can play the music legally.

"Performing" and "recording" music are separate things. To legally record the music with your camcorder, you need a mechanical license (for the physical copy you make) and a sync license (because it is "synced" to other work; here that being the video part), and ASCAP and BMI do not offer those licenses for any money- they aren't in that business. Those rights originate with the artists and are typically signed over to the record labels, who typically do not sell them to "small-time" operators like videographers, in fact most labels will not even give you the time of day. So (in the USA) there is no opportunity for you to legally use "major label" music in a video, even though the DJ's performance may be above-board.

Apparently in Britain & Australia there is some equivalent to ASCAP which does offer mech & synch licenses for small-time, non-public video projects like wedding video. Also: I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice.

Yep, I'm all eat up with it. I've been trying to get a sync license for over a year :)

http://www.sonymediasoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?ForumID=4&MessageID=205404

> Personally I don't see where selling a DVD with copyrighted music on it, without artist/publisher permission, is allowed by US copyright law so I don't know what they mean by "grey area".

I guessing that it might be grey area because you could argue that recording a wedding reception is just documenting a historic event and the music is incidental (like for ENG). If you blatantly cut the video to music, or add your own music, then it’s clearly a copyright violation because you need a sync license to do that. But if you are recording two people on their wedding day and music is playing in the background, and the tape will only be used for private viewing, then that’s seems pretty grey to me (but I’m not a lawyer ;-)). If a master of ceremony is talking as he announces the couple and their bridal party as each joins in on the dance floor, then there is no way NOT to include the music without loosing the dialog. It seems like the copyright laws need to be amended to be clearer about these things.

~jr