[78-L] Question about re-releasing commercial European 78 rpm recordings

[zimrec@juno.com]

There was a thread a month ago about EU copyright.  Perhaps list members may be interested in my personal experience back in the 1970s. I had licensed the 1961 Al Cohn - Zoot Sims "Either Way" recording from Fred Miles who had originally issued it on his own label.  The recording had what was termed "ping pong stereo," i,.e., widely separated left & right audio with almost no middle.  I remixed the two channel master to lessen the separation and claimed copyright based on the re-engineered sound.  Copyright was granted by Library of Congress. At the same time, I arranged for a separate license for Fred with a Japanese company for distribution there.  Fred still had the original artwork, which had separate b&w head shots of both sax players, each used separately on either side of the jacket.  There was no descriptive liner text, only album title, song titles & personnel knocked out in white against a dark background across the top of the jacket on both sides.  And, as a novelty, the spine was split so the LP could be removed from left or right. Because one of the original cover art layout photos had been bent while in Fred's possession, I had the cover art redone and added descriptive liner notes.  The Japanese borrowed a copy of the original LP from a collector forreproducing cover art release there. The master tape that was furnished to the Japanese company by me was a copy of my remix, not Fred's original. In one of those tragic stories from the recording industry that one occasionally hears about, the SRO quarters where Fred lived in Philadelphia was robbed.  Gone were an open reel tape deck (10.5 inch reel format) and several reels of tape, including the original "Either Way" master, a reel with alternate takes which I had never heard but which Fred told me had noise, and an Al Haig solo master that was never released.  (Of the Haig, I had once borrowed it and made copy of several tracks on cassette for interested Japanese party, but it was more cocktail than jazz which may be why the Japanese company never licensed it.  Alas. I did not make a copy of any of that for myself.) Some years after my license expired, Evidence Music purchased the rights from Fred and subsequently issued the material on CD.  About the same time, the Japanese company issued the recording on CD.  I notified Evidence Records who faxed the Japanese firm which replied that, under Japanese copyright law, the recording from 1961 after 25 years had fallen into public domain.  What they had failed to realize was that while it may have been true for the original master, what they had issued on CD was my 1977 master which was then still under copyright.  Thus, the Japanese firm was forced to withdraw the CD after they were furnished with a copy of my copyright document. Interestingly, while I had returned the original master tapes to Fred, I had actually kept the original artwork and was able to furnish those layouts to Evidence Records. Art  
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