As of press time for this month’s $50 Week, the hotly contested Stop Online Piracy Act is still under debate at the House Judiciary Committee. The bill’s bottom line may prove to have disastrous outcomes for legitimate websites, blogs, and news outlets—but what it does show us is that what was once a gray area of Internet trading and downloading is becoming more stridently black and white. Illegally downloading a Ring Cycle in the name of saving $150 has gone from being untraceable and innocuous to an act that could result in serious legal repercussions. Likewise, websites such as PianoFiles.com, regarded by many to be merely an extensive and less-analog extension of the sheet music section of a public library, have come under attack from artists whose work is being compromised.
For many singers, sheet music becomes one of those items that is purchased as steadily as groceries. It fills every imaginable space of an apartment. On a near daily basis I see singer colleagues tweet and Facebook requests for the soprano aria from Mendelssohn’s Paulus or the third act of Gounod’s Faust, and such requests are often met within minutes, often with links to free PDFs online if not the offer by someone to scan in their personal copy.
As the author of a budget column geared toward singers and their lifestyles and shopping habits, I often encourage artists to seek out the lowest price points (especially when it comes to a frequent purchase). I single out websites like PaperbackSwap.com or Powells.com for trading and buying used. I encourage readers to maximize their social networks to get as much as they can for free. But how much is too much?
The Experiment
In investigating this, I turned to Broadway composer Jason Robert Brown. About six months ago, Brown wrote on his own blog about an experiment in going onto a free sheet music website and requesting that those posting his music for free take it down immediately. He wrote to about 400 of the 4,000 users on the website offering his music for “trade” and generally received sheepish, positive response.
But what constitutes most of Brown’s blog post (a post that generated 159 comments and a conversation that took over several social networks last June) is the correspondence over three weeks with one user who felt that sharing Brown’s music was supporting the composer and his work—and supporting herself as she did not have a credit card or the ability to purchase sheet music from a legitimate website.
Brown’s wife, composer Georgia Stitt, had a similar experience with a similar website, garnering support in an e-mail about the problem from the likes of Stephen Schwartz, the Dramatists Guild, Warner/Chappell, the Songwriters Guild, and the National Music Publishers’ Association. Stitt came to the dual conclusion in 2009 that many Internet denizens do not realize that trading sheet music is illegal. Nor do they necessarily know how to find particular works through legitimate venues (at a masterclass given by Stitt, students said they would spend $10 for a piece of sheet music but didn’t know where to find it).
How Much “Free” Costs
As Brown explained to me recently, the royalties paid to composers are not the only factors at stake in the online trading—or, to be more blunt, illegal downloading—of sheet music. Brown acknowledges that he is at a point in his career when these royalties aren’t the main source of his income, but also points out that his royalties aren’t the issue.
“One of the more important things that nobody talks about is exactly how much it costs to produce that piece of sheet music you might be stealing,” Brown explains. “Even with work that’s in the public domain, there’s certainly a difference between an edition published in 1878 and a contemporary edition published in 2005. And that difference is a lot of editing, a lot of typesetting, and a lot of proofing.”
Even in spite of the numerous technological advances made over the last century, copying and editing sheet music is still a people- and time-intensive process. For a new work, such as those written by Brown, the work of an orchestrator is often required. There are also copyists and editors and proofreaders, all of whom are generally hired on a freelance basis and all of whom derive their paychecks, ultimately, from the sale of the sheet music in which they have a hand.
When Public Domain Still Pays
“It’s important not to take it for granted that that publishing company exists in the first place,” adds Brown. Denying a major publisher like Boosey & Hawkes or Schirmer $9.99 for a book of tenor arias may seem like a drop in the companies’ massive buckets, but that drop has a strong ripple effect. And with many composers—such as Daron Hagen or Philip Glass—turning to independently or self-run publishers, the effects are more immediate and tangible.
It’s also important to note, however, that composers who have been long dead—from Verdi to Monteverdi—are also still an income source for major publishers, which is why new editions of Mozart’s Requiem and Tchaikovsky’s Pique Dame are still made. As instruments progress and music becomes digitized, editions become cleaner, adjusted for contemporary musical capabilities and score markings. Brahms may not be collecting royalties on his Ein deutsches Requiem, but someone is (and rightfully so).
The Not-So-Gray Area
Where does that leave soloists at the New York Public Library’s Lincoln Center branch photocopying Schubert Lieder or choral artists loaning out binders of Tallis motets? Right where they are now. For all of the vagueness brought on by the digital age (“there’s no borrowing in the world of Internet culture, it’s all given,” Brown says), some things are still pretty clearly black and white.
Copyright law comes into heavy play on this: per the Copyright Act of 1976, certain instances of copying and distribution are permissible under fair use, which is taken on a case-by-case basis and factors into account the purpose and character of use, the nature of the work, the amount used, and the potential monetary effect of said copying. In the grand scheme of things, borrowing a Schirmer songbook from your friend to grab a necessary work isn’t going to harm Schirmer, you, your friend, or any composer (public domain or not). On paper, it may be comparable to getting sheet music from a stranger on the Internet, but spend 30 seconds with your conscience and you know what’s right and what’s wrong.
“I think there is such a thing as a community,” says Brown. “It’s important to distinguish between how that community functions and how that community falls apart.” Brown goes on to add that being considerate is when you loan a friend your copy of The Last Five Years for an audition and they return it once they’re done. The falling apart happens when you say, in Brown’s example, “Oh, I see you have an entire library of songs. Can I just take all of those?”
Community Works
As artists reading this magazine, no one needs to tell you that the economy has not been kind to the creative industries in recent years. However, the surest way to derail the arts community is to take away the community itself. Truth is, there are blessed few people in the classical music industry—from international-level singers down to development interns—who aren’t among “the 99 percent,” so there’s really no sense in Robin Hood-ing the fast-diminishing number of labels and publishers.
“There are a whole lot of lies used as justification for why you’re allowed to use these websites,” says Brown, whose correspondent in his own crusade to get his music taken down from illegal trading said that the legitimacy of her preferred website resided in the fact that no files were hosted on the site itself and were only traded via e-mail. “There are plenty of very legitimate and clear laws against doing exactly that,” Brown adds. “But there are also laws against running a stop sign. People do that sort of stuff all the time and think, ‘Nobody cares. Nobody is really paying attention.’”
But, as very legitimate companies like Opera Boston are now shutting doors and the fates of other festivals and organizations are unclear with dwindling donations and ticket sales, not caring is perhaps the greatest threat to the arts world. Morals aren’t free, but they do yield an eventual return on the investment.
Where’s the High Road?
Of course, all told, singers still rely on sheet music as much as they rely on water, Throat Coat, Tiger Balm, and lozenges. And not every singer lives in a city with a strong arts library system such as New York, Boston, San Francisco, or Chicago. There’s still nothing morally reprehensible about posting to your social network asking for a work you need, just as there is nothing morally reprehensible about going to the Lincoln Center library to photocopy a Liszt song for yourself or your friend in Des Moines. And given how connected you can still remain with college friends and former cast and chorus mates, there’s a seemingly endless pool to wade in if your own ability to get a piece of sheet music for the price of a photocopy is impeded by supply or location.
An argument brought up in Brown’s discussion with illegal traders is that such downloading is often necessitated by needing something immediately. This is where, as in so many cases of fiscal responsibility, the adage of an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure comes into play. Take advantage of being at a college campus to access their library for future needs. Spend an afternoon on your next trip to a major metropolis to use their library facilities (you don’t have to have a library card to examine or photocopy books in-house). And budget for the occasional last-minute purchase from legitimate websites like SheetmusicDirect.us or SheetmusicPlus.com. The $3.99 price tag adds up if you’re hitting up these websites as if they’re Starbucks, but the occasional fiver thrown their way will leave such companies (and the people who staff them) less financially bankrupt just as swiftly as it will leave you less morally bankrupt.
