“Most songs are copyright protected, and cannot be used unless they are licensed,” Ralph Clevenger emphasized when we talked the other day. Actually, he emphasized this point a number of times, noting that this very obvious point is not so very obvious to many photographers putting images to sound.
I wasn’t to me, which is why for my “Milonga de Sal y Pimienta” video, which I posted here in May, I totally — major oops — stole music from Gotan Project to achieve my artist goal. I just wasn’t thinking, inspired by the music itself to make my video. Heck, the music is the best part of the piece!
It’s no excuse, but I think my music-using ignorance is somewhat understandable. After all, millions of YouTube videos feature illegally-used music, and, right or wrong, this has given me a sense that using music any which way is AOK. Well, it’s not. Just like it’s not OK for people to use our images without permission.
To get myself on the right side of the intellectual property of music, yesterday I threw this little baby together, appropriately called, “Royalty-Free Buenos Aires.”
It’s clearly nothing special, but Continue reading “Royalty-Free Music Rocks, Rolls and (Legally) Produces Drama”
