Making recordings

[docmattc]

Reading the parish newsletter this morning, I discovered that there is a plan to record the Sunday Mass for the housebound. Can anyone tell me what, if any, copyright issues we have to consider in recording the musical parts?

[Nick Baty]

We recorded our Easter Triduum and compiled a CD of highlights.

For all the OCP stuff (Walker, Farrell, Inwood et al) you apply to MCPS for a Limited Manufacture Licence: Costs between £20 and £30 depending on how many copies you're making. Cost goes up when you go over 50 copies. I think the minimum is £20 per item. Takes minutes to do online: http://www.prsformusic.com

Taizé gave us permission for two items for nothing as did Belmont Abbey for a piece by Alan Rees and Continuum for James Quinn's translation of Pange Lingua. The John Ireland Trust gave permission for My Song is Love Unknown on the condition that I sent a copy for their files which I have yet to do.

We included several of our own psalm settings but omitted those which set Grail text as in the past I've found them rather unwilling to grant permissions.

Everyone was incredibly kind and helpful. I made all enquiries by email and received replies in no time at all. I was working against the clock as I edited the recording on the Monday to Wednesday of Holy Week, had it to the CD production company on the Thurday and spent Friday popping copies into the cases ready for distribution the following Sunday.

Most duplication companies will also duplicate artwork for you too but this puts up the price by £15-£25.

Hope this is some use.

[docmattc]

Thanks Nick,
So it looks like the parish council have just increased my workload considerably. In order to include the few unable to make it on a Sunday, (not that their inclusion isn't a laudable aim) I'm going to have to seek permission to record pieces of music week in, week out, and limit what the assembly might sing to that which I can get permission to record. As we use Grail texts for the psalm 90% of the time, we will no longer be able to sing the psalm.

However, as an average Sunday Mass has 10 pieces of music, the plan is going to cost the parish about £200 per week, so they'll either decide to follow the 11th commandment or abandon the idea.

[Nick Baty]

Wow! Didn't realise you were planning on doing it every week – that's a mammoth undertaking. The editing alone takes hours, to say nothing of the time of copying CDs.

[docmattc]

I'm not thinking of doing it at all. All I know is the following from today's newsletter:

Do you know anyone who would like to receive a recording of the Sunday Mass? The Parish Ministry Team are looking at the possibility of recording the Mass for housebound parishioners. If you know of anyone who would like this, please let us know what format (eg cd or tape) they have.

I wouldn't begin to imagine that 'looking into the possibility' actually means anyone has looked into the practicalities. This is a group which, to use a local expression, is all mouth and no trousers.

[Peter]

Christian Copyright Licensing International offer a licence to record music - in fact their Church Copyright Licence (CCL) may be sufficient for what you want, provided you use the repertoire it covers, typically Kevin Mayhew, Graham Kendrick and John Glynn as well as more traditional hymns owned by OUP, Faber, HA&M etc. However, it does not cover Grail, Taizé, GIA, OCP, NALR, Thomas More and other items whose words and melodies are covered by a Calamus licence. As far as I know, Calamus don't offer a recording licence.

You can find more details at http://www.ccli.co.uk/licences/churches_option1-ccl.cfm.

[Southern Comfort]

I know of two churches locally who are contemplating doing this, and I have heard of others where for years they have been making a cassette tape every Sunday. They don't edit: they simply record the whole Mass, which is then taken to the housebound person by the minister who is bringing them Communion.

Although in theory one ought to be seeking permission for everything - prayers, readings, music - in practice my impression is that those parishes who do this regularly simply don't bother.

The rationale would run something like this: recording without permission is an abuse if the recording is produced in substantial numbers and/or will be sold (e.g. as a fundraiser). Making a recording as a pastoral act of kindness for half a dozen old ladies is not an abuse of the law.

The two churches contemplating doing it are wondering how feasible it is to take a feed off the church's PA system, rather than using their own mic. It strikes me that a direct feed would in practice mean that much of the music would be less than audible (assuming the priest didn't sing along with everything ).

[Nick Baty]

Making a recording as a pastoral act of kindness for half a dozen old ladies is not an abuse of the law.

Excuse me, SC, if I stress that this is just you thinking out loud – and thinking exactly the same way as many of us. However, theft is theft. You might steal a cream bun from Tesco as an act of kindness for someone but it's still theft. It's the same with the fundraising cop-out: If you took my sofa to sell for church funds without my permission, I'd be a tad miffed to say the least.

I'm only stressing this so people reading the above post don't think it's OK to go ahead – because it isn't. And a legal action under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 could take quite a chunk out of parish funds.

I was wrong in an earlier post about cost. For up to five copies, you can pay as little as £5 per item as long as each item is no more than five minutes long. Details here: http://www.prsformusic.com/MUSICFORPROD ... es/LM.aspx

[mcb]

Is it theft Nick? It seems to me it only is if you leave the definition to publishers' accountants and lawyers, whose job it is to maximise their clients' income, rather make juridical pronouncements about what's right and what's wrong. In the cases Doc and SC are talking about, it's not clear at all that anyone is being deprived of their property, nor or their rightful income, except by their own assertion that they should be paid for what's being contemplated. What's that got in common with taking a bun from Tesco?

De minimis non curat lex seems a good guiding principle here. It's hard to believe a publisher would really go after a parish in the circumstances being described, and hard to believe they'd get anywhere if they did. Unless anyone knows better from experience?

[Nick Baty]

Of course it's theft.

You are depriving a labourer of their wages. To what extent you'd get away with it is a different matter. But any parish which was prosecuted would be heavily fined.

[mcb]

You are depriving a labourer of their wages.

Nope, I can't see that. Which labourer performs which work when the parish records its Sunday Mass for the benefit of half a dozen housebound members of the community?

[Nick Baty]

You are depriving a labourer of their wages.

Nope, I can't see that. Which labourer performs which work when the parish records its Sunday Mass for the benefit of half a dozen housebound members of the community?

The composer is denied the payment which is legally theirs.

[mcb]

The composer is denied the payment which is legally theirs.

I don't think that's an answer to my question. We'd better agree to differ!
M.

[Nick Baty]

You're right – I haven't quite answered your question and I'm sure that we could debate the ethics of the whole thing – on which we'd probably agree – for ever.

But the fact remains that parishes which make unlicensed recordings, could be prosecuted. And I only made my earlier post to stress this. It would be wrong to suggest that they should just carry on and lead them into legal difficulties.

[Southern Comfort]

You are depriving a labourer of their wages.

Nope, I can't see that. Which labourer performs which work when the parish records its Sunday Mass for the benefit of half a dozen housebound members of the community?

The composer is denied the payment which is legally theirs.

Actually, I don't think this assertion is true. The parish is in fact losing money making the recording, and there is no revenue to the parish from those being serviced by this act of charity (unless they leave them something whopping in their wills!). You can't have a royalty on what is effectively a minus amount. The composer is therefore being asked in effect to add their donation to the charitable act, and I can't imagine that many would refuse.

Looking at it from another aspect, the recording is an extension of the act of worship, and we all know that the Performing Right Society do not levy performing rights on acts of worship (unless they are broadcast), even though they are entitled to. Acts of worship are treated as exempt, and therefore the recording could be deemed also to be exempt. (Yes, the broadcast is also in a sense an extension of the act of worship, but much, much wider than to just a handful of identifiable regular members of the community in question. I think this is what makes the difference, morally, if not legally.)

As I said before, my opinion is that when we're talking about a tiny usage, in practice there's no real problem. But if a parish were producing dozens of recordings each week, then that might be considered a different case (don't ask me why ─ just a gut feeling that this seems more like an "industry" than a small act of charity), especially if they asked for a charge to cover the cost of doing it.

[As a slightly sinister footnote to my last remark, a minister of Communion near here recently took Communion to a lady who had been visited for a number of years by another minister who was away in hospital. The lady offered the stand-in minister an envelope in which there was a £20 note. The minister asked what it was, and was told "It's the fee". It turned out that the normal minister had been charging the old lady £20 a week for years to bring her Communion..... ]