Any copyright lawyers here?

[bbernardini]

I have a question I'd like to ask you.

[KurtNYC]

1. Some background in intellectual property

fire away

[bbernardini]

2. Here 'tis...

The school I work for has a "chapel" program three times a week: once for middle school, once for lower school, and once for everybody. Not really religious, but more of a time to talk about things to make you a proper human.

Enough background. At the beginning of every chapel, the kids sing the "Old 100th" hymn, and at the end, they sing a song somebody (usually me, or the teacher giving the chapel) chooses. These are currently lyrics or a basic lead sheet (melody and lyrics) we hand out to every kid on their way in.

The head of the school would like to have a "Chapel Songbook", comprising all of our current song material, as well as other songs we'd like to incorporate at some point. At the moment, the bulk of the material we use is easily out of copyright, both musically and lyrically (old hymns, patriotic tunes, etc.). What I'd like to do is make a consistently formatted set of lead sheets for each tune, featuring just the lyrics and the melody. Since we'll be incorporating all of this material into our classroom work (we'll have to teach some of the songs), would this fall under the protection of "fair use"? I have no plans to make 350 copies of commercially available sheet music. Also, the songbook would not be sold in any way. It probably wouldn't even be professionally made. It's just something to hand out to the kids as they come in, and then we'll collect it when they leave.

I can give you examples of the type of music that would be in it, if you like.

[KurtNYC]

3. Copyrights

Some music, especially hymns, are aready in the public domain. Most works copyrighted before 1928 have fallen out of copyright protection now. With works in those categories you can transcribe and otherwise distribute copies.

With works NOT meeting those conditions, it is a bit more complex:

In the case of music, the law is very restrictive with one exception: in a church setting, copyrighted music may be sung or performed freely as a part of the religious service. (In secular settings, musicians must pay a fee to perform copyrighted music.) Other than that one exception, a church must seek and secure permission from the copyright holder prior to

1. reproducing copyrighted music or lyrics in any manner, whether by overhead transparencies, word-only chorus books-even hand-written words on a chalkboard
2. taping copyrighted music, even for sharing the service with shut-ins or in order to help a choir or music group learn a piece
3. putting new words to copyrighted music or matching copyrighted words to new or different music
4. creating new arrangements of copyrighted music (for instance, for a women's trio or a church orchestra)
Frankly, the chances of a church getting caught or of a copyright holder suing are slim. But the law nevertheless stands, and churches should be law-abiding. Of equal importance, churches by their unwarranted use of a work should not be depriving the originator of the music and the publisher of a fair financial return on their efforts.

More: http://cpinet.christianpublications.com/cpipublishing.nsf/0/a70ac687695d9c3e85256e44006e5014?OpenDocument

Still more:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=fair+use+hymns&btnG=Google+Search

Hope that helps. :-)