Three members of the group Spandau Ballet sought to be treated as joint authors of the songs in which copyright was claimed. The songs had been composed at home by another member of the group who was a keyboard player and singer, but then played and learned by the claimants, who added their own interpretation to the performance.
Held: Their contribution as performers was not a sufficient original contribution to the creation of the songs for them to count as joint authors.
Judges:
Park J
Citations:
[1999] EMLR 589
Jurisdiction:
England and Wales
Citing:
Cited – Godfrey v Lees 1995
The court described the test for joint authorship in a work of music: ‘What the claimant to joint authorship of a work must establish is that he has made a significant and original contribution to the creation of the work and that he has done so . .
Cited by:
Cited – Sawkins v Hyperion Records Limited ChD 5-Jul-2004
The claimant had edited ancient music scores so as to be ready for performance for the defendant. He asserted a copyright. The defendants argued that the contribution was too little to create a copyright.
Held: To succeed Dr Sawkins had to . .
Cited – Hyperion Records Ltd v Sawkins CA 19-May-2005
The claimant had developed historical musical works for performance. They were published by the defendant, by means of recordings of a performance from the scores he had prepared – so called ‘performance editions’. The many hundreds of hours . .
Cited – Hodgens v Beckingham CA 19-Feb-2003
The defendant appealed a finding of infringement in a music copyright work, ‘Young at Heart’, based on a claim of joint authorship. The claimant had delayed his claim for many years, but now sought only rights to future royalties.
Held: The . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.
Intellectual Property
Updated: 24 November 2022; Ref: scu.199974