Copyright

Hello! I’m doing some research on copyright for music and lyrics, here it is! When you write music you have copyrights upon your completion of the work these copyrights last up until 70 years after the composer’s death or a total of 95 years. Having a copyright means you own the exclusive rights to the composition also know as Intellectual Property. The current year for Public Domain in the United States is January 1st 2019. The difference between public domain and proof of public domain is, in public domain anyone can use your work and if you have proof of public domain anyone can use your work but they must cite or give you credit.

In order for you to better understand what I just told you. Here is a list of the rules for copyright music and lyrics.
• Students and teachers creating educational materials must follow the guidelines and site the source
• You can use up to 10% (no more than 1000 words)
• You can use up to 250 words of an entire poem
• You may not use more the 3 poems or portions of a poem by one poet
• You may use a signal photograph
• You may not use more than 5 images by a signal artist
• In plays, movies or TV shows you can’t use more than 10%
• For music you can only use 30 seconds

One famous case on music or lyric copyrights you may or may not know of is Vanilla Ice vs. Queen& Bowie. The song “Ice Ice baby” by Vanilla Ice has some of the same rhythm of the baseline as the song “Under Pressure” by Queen and David Bowie’s. Vanilla thought by changing the baseline rhythm he could avoid questions about crediting Queen& Bowie. Although the case never made it to court it was clear the Vanilla stole the sample without permission. The group of artists settled out of court for an undisclosed but probably high amount on Vanilla Ice’s part.