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Topic: What is a Traditional Song ? |
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
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Posted 1 Sep 2008 3:39 pm |
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The question often arises as to whether a song is "traditional" or not. Most folk singers would like all songs to be traditional, because it makes the whole copyright issue irrelevant.
It seems to me that a "traditional" song is one which is old enough that no-one has any idea of who wrote it. But songs don't write themselves. EVERY song was written by someone at some time. For a song to become part of heritage it has to have been resung and changed over the years. A good example of this is "The Young Sailor Cut Down in His Prime", which is an old English song of unknown origin. Over the years it has mutated into several variations, the most well-known of which are "St. James Infirmary Blues", "The Streets of Laredo", "Old Joe's Barroom", "Tom Sherman's Barroom", to name but a few. But someone at some time wrote the song, and it probably wasn't written originally as The Young Sailor Cut Down in His Prime, because there are other variants in England and Scotland.
Age itself doesn't bestow tradition onto a song. For instance, "Greensleeves" is recorded as having been written by Henry VIII. That may be so. Only the idle artistocracy had enough time on their hands to sit around playing music all day. But there are versions of Greensleeves in both major and minor keys, and not all attributed to King Harry, so he may bave plaguerized the song or just stolen it.
Again, many litugical songs and hymns are hundreds of years old, but the author is known.
Is "John Brown's Body" traditional ? Nobody knows who wrote it, but it's the same tune as the older song "Sir Jasper".
Most people believe "Happy Birthday to You" to be traditional. This is what Wikepedia has to say about it:-
"Happy Birthday to You," also known more simply as "Happy Birthday," is a traditional American song that is sung with joy to celebrate and commemorate the anniversary of a person's birth. Per the Guinness Book of World Records, "Happy Birthday to You" is presently noted as the most well recognized song in the English language, followed by, yet just as well liked, "For He's a Jolly Good Fellow" and "Auld Lang Syne"[1]. The song's base lyrics have been translated into at least 18 languages[2].
In spite of its lyrics, the basic melody of "Happy Birthday to You" comes from the roundelay song "Good Morning to All," which was written and simply composed by the two American sisters Patty Hill and Mildred J. Hill in 1893. At the time of the tune's homespun inception, they were both kindergarten school teachers in Louisville, Kentucky, developing various teaching methods at what is now the Little Loomhouse.[3][4] The American sisters created "Good Morning to All" as a song that would be easy to sing by young children[5]. The combination of melody and lyrics in "Happy Birthday to You" is most likely to have appeared in print beginning in 1912, and probably existed even earlier.[6] None of these early appearances included credits or copyright notices. The Summy Company registered for copyright in 1935, garnering credit for authors Preston Ware Orem and Mrs. R.R. Forman. In 1990, Warner Chappell purchased the company owning the copyright for US$15 million, with the value of "Happy Birthday" estimated at US$5 million.[7] Based on the 1935 copyright registration, Warner claims that US copyright won't expire until 2030, and that unauthorized public performances of the song are technically illegal unless royalties are paid to it.
The actual copyright status of "Happy Birthday to You" began to draw more attention with the passage of the Copyright Term Extension Act in 1998. When the Supreme Court upheld the Act in Eldred v. Ashcroft in 2003, Judge Breyer specifically mentioned "Happy Birthday to You" in his dissenting opinion.[8] Professor Robert Brauneis went so far as to conclude "it is doubtful that 'Happy Birthday to You,' the famous offspring of 'Good Morning to All,' is really still under copyright," in his heavily researched 2008 paper.[9] |
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Robert Leaman
From:
Murphy, North Carolina, USA
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Posted 1 Sep 2008 4:12 pm
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My information describes a traditional song as a ballad that tells a story about a tradition(s).
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David Doggett
From:
Bawl'mer, MD (formerly of MS, Nawluns, Gnashville, Knocksville, Lost Angeles, Bahsten. and Philly)
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Posted 1 Sep 2008 5:46 pm
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| I think Alan means "traditional" in the sense of public domain. This is purely a legal matter of whether someone holds a valid copyright, and, as he points out, has nothing to do with tradition or whether the author is known. |
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Dave Mudgett
From:
Central Pennsylvania and Gallatin, Tennessee
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Posted 1 Sep 2008 10:58 pm
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I think there are too many differing connotations to the word "traditional" to make an unambiguous interpretation.
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| I think Alan means "traditional" in the sense of public domain. This is purely a legal matter of whether someone holds a valid copyright, and, as he points out, has nothing to do with tradition or whether the author is known. |
Well - there is "truth", "legal truth", and "apparent legal truth", and they aren't necessarily the same thing. I'd be interested to see a case where WB actually tried to defend that HB copyright. I'm very dubious. Just because someone asserts they have a legal copyright doesn't mean they do. They mostly have the power of lawyers, guns, and money, but in the end, that may not be enough if anybody really wanted to take them on.
I go with a musicological definition of "traditional", but that can have even more shades of meaning than lawyers could ascribe. Context is everything. Traditional folk (tell me what folk tradition you want to talk about - American, British, Irish, Russian, African, whatever), traditional country, traditional blues, traditional jazz, traditional punk, rockabilly, heavy metal - often called "old-school" - it can go on ad infinitum, ad nauseum. I know people who consider Olivia Newton-John traditional country - in fact, the local cable "traditional country" radio plays her stuff about as much as George Jones and Merle Haggard.  |
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Theresa Galbraith
From:
Goodlettsville,Tn. USA
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Posted 2 Sep 2008 8:49 am
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Mark Chestnut, Joe Diffie, Alan Jackson, George Strait, Lee Ann Womack, & the list goes on and on. 
Just about everything they've released and songs never released for radio airplay. |
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Brint Hannay
From:
Maryland, USA
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Posted 2 Sep 2008 9:28 am
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| There was a story going around a few years back that Paul McCartney, or Michael Jackson, or Paul, then Michael, I forget which, bought the copyright (or was it "performance rights") to "Happy Birthday", among many, many other songs not written by them. Is that an "urban myth"? |
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Donny Hinson
From:
Glen Burnie, Md. U.S.A.
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Posted 3 Sep 2008 4:12 pm
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| I always heard that the words of "Happy Birthday" were what was still copyrighted, while the melody itself was in the public domain. |
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Edward Meisse
From:
Santa Rosa, California, USA
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Posted 3 Sep 2008 4:52 pm
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I think we need a trivia section. 
_________________
Amor vincit omnia |
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chris ivey
From:
california (deceased)
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Posted 4 Sep 2008 8:39 pm
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| i thought someone told me grady martin got royalties for happy birthday... |
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