The first time I was aware
that we were not allowed to sing “Happy Birthday to you” unless we paid the
copyright owners was while watching a baseball game on TV. The announcers
wanted to sing the ditty to a centenarian who had followed the team all the
years of her life but had been informed they could not do it on the air because
they would be sued by the “owners” of the song if they did. Instead, they
wished her “a joyful natal occasion.” It wasn’t quite the same.
It seemed ludicrous. But
there were people who claimed they had “written” the song, back in the 1930s,
and early in this century their claim had been purchased, for several million dollars,
by a company, that was now trying to enforce the copyright by making people pay
to sing the song. [1]
Okay, I am going to remind
you that I wrote “Happy birthday to you, you belong in the zoo, you look like a
monkey, and smell like one, too.” Don’t sing that to anyone unless you send me
money first.
Actually, as a writer, I
am very much in favor of copyright laws, and of acknowledging and paying the
folks who write and compose.
When I was at
HarperCollins in NYC to record the audio version of my cancer book [2], at
several points, I started singing little ditties in the manuscript, songs I had
made up to sing while I was recovering, such as “No more cancer” to the tune of
Edelweiss. The engineers said, “You can’t do that; that tune belongs to Richard
Rodgers.” So I had to improvise on the spot, and sing to a different tune, one
in the public domain. So that particular little song became “No more cancer, no
more cancer,” to the tune of “Oh, Freedom.” That happened six or seven times in
the process of recording that book.
The way some folks act,
you’d think they had copyrighted, and now own, “Jesus Loves Me.” Only they are
allowed to sing it and believe it. The rest of us have to go to their
birthday party of we don’t get to party at all. It’s wise for all of us to
remember that only the Creator has the copyright on life.
JRMcF
johnrobertmcfarland@gmail.com
1] In 2015, a federal
judge ruled that the various companies claiming copyright to “Happy Birthday,”
and thus exclusive use of it, unless we paid them in order to sing it, that all
their copyright claims were invalid, and folks could go back to singing the
song just like we always had.
2] NOW THAT I HAVE CANCER I AM WHOLE: Reflections on Life and Healing for
Cancer Patients and Those Who Love Them, is published by AndrewsMcMeel. It
is available from Barnes & Noble, Amazon, etc. in hardback, paperback,
audio, Japanese, and Czech.
I just noticed that in the
October 16 blog, I mentioned “Sylvia” several times without adding a last name.
It is possible that I just assumed if one is talking about a former opera and
Broadway star who teaches at the Jacobs School of Music at IU, everyone will
know which Sylvia it is. Or maybe I just forgot to say McNair.
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