IMSLP Forums

In 1999 I received an unpublished autograph of a work from a friend of a deceased composer. The friend is now deceased. In 1999 I sequenced it and put it on my music web page in Finale format and rather forgot about it. In 2005 the U of I Sousa Archive and Center for American Music received this composer's collected works, papers, concert programs and other documents. This collection includes the work I uploaded to my page. I recently added this composer to the composer list of IMSLP with the intention of uploading a pdf file of this work. Because the composer died in 1977 I was given lots of warnings about the composer's works not being PD in Canada, the EU or likely the U.S. Two questions: Will the composer's name be put up on IMSLP in any case? What chance have I that this work will be accepted by IMSLP? Otherwise, I'll put it up on my own music web page. What opinion on the matter can you offer?

What is the composer's name?

You're right that this composer's works are not in the public domain. They won't be public domain in Canada until 2027. It will be even longer elsewhere. In order to upload his or her works to IMSLP, you will need permission from the copyright holder. I would think the first step here would be to contact the U of I archive and try to find out who donated the collected works.

Unless the composer signed a document in which all copyright interest in the work was assigned to you, the copyright is owned by the legal heirs of the composer - not by the library which owns manuscripts, not by friends or even family members (unless they are legal heirs). Written permission from the copyright owner must therefore be obtained before anything of this nature can be posted here. Additionally, the copyright owner (not the uploader) must designate which of the available licenses is to be used for the work. The plain-vanilla "Creative Commons Attribution 3.0", to give one example, is almost the same as public domain insofar that it allows for unlimited distribution, performance, etc. - even for explicitly commercial purposes - as long as the "attribution" (the composer is credited as the composer) is maintained. Other licenses are more restrictive in terms of usage, derivative works, etc.