IMSLP Forums

More than 20 years ago I purchased a collection of CDs. Many of them include recordings copyrighted by Supraphon around 1960 - 1980. Supraphon is quite a special case in the copyright domain, so I wonder if these recordings may be eligible for being uploaded to IMSLP. Any ideas?

Max

Once again, the utter insanity of US copyright strikes. Essentially, there are no public domain recordings from before 1972. For items 1972-1977, as long as there is some sort of claim on the recording, the album cover or the CD booklet, it's covered by US copyright for 95 years from issue. Items issued after 1977 are 70 pma of the last surviving contributor. the net effect of all this is that there are basically no recordings which are public domain in the USA. If we has something set up for recordings on the EU server, there might be a possibility, but even that is slim as the recordings are less than 50 years old (EU) and the odds of the last contributor being dead over 50 years (Canada) are very small.

I thought there could be a chance based on this statement (from http://imslp.org/wiki/Public_domain#Czech_Republic):

All Czech government publications are in the public domain. This notably affects Artia/Orbis/SNKLHU/Supraphon, which was a government organization from 1948 to 1989. See the Czech Republic copyright act (file hosted by OSA, Czech author's rights organization).

If the above statement were applicable to Supraphon recordings in the same period, they would be public domain in all countries applying the Rule of the Shorter Term (e.g., Canada and EU - the Czech Republic joined the EU in 2004, so the Rule of the Shorter Term would not be applicable any more, but probably for newer publications only). Am I wrong?

Max

The problem is with the US rule on recordings. In the EU, recordings are protected for 50 years from publication. Unfortunately, Canada's "rule of the shorter term" is so messed up that it might not apply - though oddly enough it could as long as there is more than one person involved with the recording. The critical editions issued by Artia/Supraphon/SNKLHU are a bit different as they are more of a clear-cut case in terms of being a state-publication. Even so, the works of 20th-century Czech composers issued by Supraphon have been ruled to be not actual state publications, but publications of the composers themselves. I think the same rule applies to living or recently-dead performers, etc. involved in the recordings.