Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 Opportunities for British Composers
- 2 Authors, Painters and Composers
- 3 Novello and the Music Publishing Business
- 4 Novello, Royalties and Copyrights to 1914 and the 1904 Royalty Agreement
- 5 Novello, Royalties and Copyrights 1914 to 1934 and other Music Publishers
- 6 Royalties and Copyrights on Elgar's Major Works
- 7 Elgar's Performing Fees and George Bernard Shaw
- 8 Elgar's Earnings from Broadcasting, Recording and Conducting
- 9 A Matter of Wills
- 10 Epilogue
- Appendix: Bank of England, Inflation Calculator
- Bibliography
- Index
7 - Elgar's Performing Fees and George Bernard Shaw
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 Opportunities for British Composers
- 2 Authors, Painters and Composers
- 3 Novello and the Music Publishing Business
- 4 Novello, Royalties and Copyrights to 1914 and the 1904 Royalty Agreement
- 5 Novello, Royalties and Copyrights 1914 to 1934 and other Music Publishers
- 6 Royalties and Copyrights on Elgar's Major Works
- 7 Elgar's Performing Fees and George Bernard Shaw
- 8 Elgar's Earnings from Broadcasting, Recording and Conducting
- 9 A Matter of Wills
- 10 Epilogue
- Appendix: Bank of England, Inflation Calculator
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Novello and the PRS
In his evidence to the Copyright Commission, Henry Littleton stressed that Novello's policy was to ensure that performing rights were assigned to the firm in all contracts signed with composers and Elgar was no exception to this. Novello did not, however, exercise these assigned performing rights, and its reasons for not joining the PRS, when it was formed in 1914, were articulated in a background briefing by an unnamed director and published in the Daily Telegraph, 16 July 1914. There were two separate but related points made in this briefing. First: ‘We were quite prepared to join the Society, provided they kept to the line of dealing with bodies who were using music for the purpose of making money.’ Second:
We are obliged to point out that there was a large number of people to whom music was more an amusement than a profit. Our firm has dealings with hundreds of choral societies, 99 out of 100 of which meet for pleasure. There are few that pay their way, and we felt it would be a very dangerous policy if we were to allow this Society to call upon them after their accounts were made up to pay a fee for performing our publications.
The two points are interesting as they were consistent with the firm's previous decision to secure performing fees for Elgar on Symphony No. 1, the Violin Concerto, Symphony No. 2 and Falstaff. All of these works were likely to be performed at concerts held for the purpose of making money, and none of them involved the use of amateur choral societies.
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- Chapter
- Information
- Elgar's Earnings , pp. 152 - 176Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2013