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The true turbanator: Diljit Dosanjh, ‘the

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TILL Diljit Dosanjh, in his black and white kurta and chadra, turle wali pagg and chic yellow gloves got on stage and gave a shout out to the insanely massive crowd – ‘Punjabi aa gaye Coachella oye’, we had no clue what or where Coachella was. Not only did this terrific turbanator make history by performing at the world’s most sought- after music and arts festival, he catapulted a completely phoren place on our (mind) map for eternity.

The first Sikh artiste to perform at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in California in April this year, the first to break the barriers of language, culture and geography and open doors for Asian talent, the first Indian from Punjab to perform in Punjabi at one of the grandest festivals in the world, Diljit rocked, and boy did he turn up the heat with his infectious vibe, energy and frequency beat by beat.

“I have performed on all platforms where people knew me. I wanted to experiment with a new place, a new experience, where no Punjabi had performed, where no one knew Diljit Dosanjh. Coachella was it. No artist from India has ever performed there, that too regional! I felt like a student once again, presenting my music in my language…it was exhilarating. It has opened doors for all of us,” says Diljit.

With Coachella, the ‘Dosanjhawala’ delivered Punjabi music to the world. Barely seven when he started performing in his village, Diljit gets candid about the time, when he would accompany his sister to tuition, and just to avoid it, would recite the teacher’s poems. “I started singing them, and a teacher at school would address me as kalakaar. And I am one today.”

Personally, he says, he hardly gives interviews. “But a lot of people and money is attached to a film, and I am here for them,” he says, here along with his leading lady, Nimrat Khaira for his upcoming film Jodi that releases this May 5. Easy going, honest to a fault, Diljit, who “is his own stylist” carries with him an enviable streak of simplicity. Maybe that’s why trolls, especially post-Coachella and its ‘he disrespected the Indian flag’ controversy didn’t frazzle him. “I’ve been in this industry for 20-plus years. These things would disturb me in initial years but I’ve grown past them. I believe in the truth, and that makes me fearless,” says Diljit, whose comment in Punjabi was misinterpreted. “I spoke of music, how it connects and belongs to all of us, and we should stay away from negativity.” He also pointed out the ‘singling out’ of Punjabi music, and its lyrics. “Guns, violence, casteism…it’s there in films too, Hindi included, why don’t we talk about that. Criticism has to be in balance.”

The years have induced a maturity that’s meditative and calming in Diljit who never lets the success to go to his head. “I never get offended, my team gets a little cautious, but I am in a space where I have decided to do one Punjabi film in a year. I cannot go to the set every day!” Which brings us to Jodi, directed by Amberdeep Singh, a tale of love, romance, music and humour, and “a story nowhere close to Chamkila. It’s not Chamkila’s biopic, I’ve done the proper biopic with Imtiaz Ali.”

Interestingly, the singer-actor had decided not to take up films after his first Punjabi film flopped.

“I believed the producer when he told me that the reason for the failure was that the youth don’t want to see a turbaned hero. I had no clue about films or film business, and had my second film, Jihne Mera Dil Luteya, not been a superhit, I would’ve stopped acting.”

The only turbaned actor, after the late Jaspal Bhatti, to make an impact in Hindi film industry, Diljit consciously chose roles that did not reduce Sardars to a joke. He bagged Udta Punjab after the makers saw him in Punjab 1984. “The only difference I feel between Punjabi and Hindi films is the language, rest hardwork is the same.” He is optimistic about Punjabi cinema, that it will grow phenomenally, and adds how the music industry too is getting better.

“For the first five years, I hardly made any money in music. I remember Charanjit Ahuja telling me how HMV was perhaps the only label that earned the maximum royalty from Chamkila’s music. Today, times have changed. Artists know about contracts, royalties, and their rights.” That technology-like artificial intelligence will overtake musicians is something he replies lightheartedly — “AI is not a threat, because live music will always be there — AI can’t come on stage!”

He carries Punjab in his heart, but strangely doesn’t feel a sense of belonging to any place, nor does he strike a relationship with any person or place. “It’s just who I am,” smiles the ‘kalakaar’ to whom the entire world is attached.



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Palm Beach Symphony Season to Culminate with Maria

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Palm Beach Symphony Season to Culminate with Maria João Pires

Acclaimed piano virtuoso Maria João Pires will make a rare American appearance to join Maestro Gerard Schwarz and the Palm Beach Symphony in a special season finale at the Kravis Center on Monday, May 15 at 7:30 p.m.

Pires will perform Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, which brilliantly blends the composer’s unique ability to both lift the heaviest heart and stir its deepest emotions. The program opens with the Florida premiere of the orchestral version of Adolphus Hailstork’s Monuments for solo trombone and string orchestra featuring Palm Beach Symphony Principal Trombone and Latin GRAMMY winner Domingo Pagliuca. The season culminates with the Symphony performing for the first time Franck’s Symphony in D Minor, which was once such a beloved staple of concert seasons that it appeared in programs at Carnegie Hall six times is less than two months in 1927.

“We thought the perfect way to thank our audiences for their tremendous support this season would be to treat them to a few rare gems,” said Maestro Schwarz. “Symphony orchestras don’t often perform Mozart’s piano concertos. Maria João Pires played Mozart with me at the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York and in Europe and is an extraordinary artist. Adolphus Hailstork has written a piece for solo trombone and strings that I think audiences will love, featuring Domingo Pagliuca in our orchestra. He is one of the great trombonists of today that I have been wanting to feature. When I was growing up Franck’s Symphony in D Minor was among the most popular pieces, but it somehow fell out of favor and few people have heard it performed live in years. It will be a wonderful way to close out one of our most ambitious and memorable seasons.”

A three-time GRAMMY nominee, Pires has made recordings for Erato for 15 years and Deutsche Grammophon for 20 years. Since the 1970s, she has devoted herself to reflecting the influence of art in life, community and education, trying to discover new ways of establishing this way of thinking in society. In 1999, Pires created the Belgais Centre for the Study of the Arts in Portugal and, in 2012, she initiated two complementary projects in Belgium: the Partitura Choirs, a project which creates and develops choirs for children from disadvantaged backgrounds, and the Partitura Workshops. All of the Partitura projects have the aim to create an altruistic dynamic between artists of different generations by proposing an alternative in a world too often focused on competitiveness.

Internationally recognized for his moving performances, innovative programming and extensive catalog of recordings, Maestro Schwarz is Music Director of Palm Beach Symphony, the All-Star Orchestra, Eastern Music Festival and Mozart Orchestra of New York as well as Conductor Laureate of the Seattle Symphony and Conductor Emeritus of the Mostly Mozart Festival. Also in South Florida, he serves as the Music Director of the Frost Symphony Orchestra and the Distinguished Professor of Music, Conducting and Orchestral Studies at University of Miami’s Frost School of Music. Schwarz’s extensive catalog of more than 350 recordings on 11 labels has garnered 14 GRAMMY Award nominations and includes the 30-CD box set “The Gerard Schwarz Collection.” In his five decades as a respected classical musician and conductor, Maestro Schwarz has received hundreds of honors and accolades including nine Emmy Awards, eight ASCAP Awards and numerous “Stereo Review” and Ovation Awards. He holds the Ditson Conductor’s Award from Columbia University, was the first American named Conductor of the Year by Musical America and has received numerous honorary doctorates. His memoir, “Behind the Baton,” was released by Amadeus Press in March 2017.

As a trombone soloist, Pagliuca has performed multiple times here and abroad accompanied by symphonic orchestras. These include the Orquesta Sinfónica de Venezuela, Orquesta Sinfónica de Colombia, Central Ohio Symphony, Orquesta Sinfónica de Carabobo (Vzla) performing the trombone concertos by Nino Rota, F. David, Rimsky Korsakov, F. Graffe, and LE. Larsson. In addition, he has toured throughout the United States, Latin America, and Europe with Latin Grammy-winner artists Franco De Vita, Juan Luis Guerra & 4.40, Gilberto Santa Rosa, Rubén Blades, Luis Enrique, Raphael, and Oscar D’Leon. In June 2019, Pagliuca released his first solo album, entitled Eternal Gratitude, which won a Latin Grammy Award in the category of Best Classical Music Album. A Yamaha Artist, Pagliuca joined the world-renown Boston Brass in 2013 with which he conducts master classes and performs to audiences all over the world.

This concert is made possible through the generosity of the Park Foundation and Mr. and Mrs. Patrick Park

Palm Beach Symphony’s highly anticipated Golden Anniversary Season of six Masterworks concerts will begin in November and feature Maestro Schwarz joined by pianists Yefim Bronfman, Vladimir Feltsman, Emanuel Ax and Ignat Solzhenitsyn and violinists Akiko Suwanai and Pinchas Zukerman in programs that include four world premieres composed by Ellen Taaffe Zwilich, Aaron Jay Kernis, Bright Sheng and Maestro Gerard Schwarz. Current subscribers may renew now with new subscriptions available on June 26. Tickets to individual concerts will go on sale September 5.

Tickets for this season’s finale featuring Maria João Pires are $25-$95 and may be purchased at PalmBeachSymphony.org, by calling (561) 281-0145, and at the Palm Beach Symphony Box Office weekdays from 10 a.m.-3 p.m. at 400 Hibiscus Street, Suite 100, West Palm Beach. The Kravis Center for the Performing Arts is located at 701 Okeechobee Blvd. in West Palm Beach.

Proud sponsors of Palm Beach Symphony include Max and Christine Ansbacher, Mrs. James N. Bay, Alan Benaroya, JoAnne Berkow, David C. and Eunice Bigelow, Leslie Rogers Blum, James R. Borynack and Adolfo Zaralegui/Findlay Galleries, Braman Motorcars, Thomas and Carol Bruce, CIBC Private Wealth, The Colony Hotel, The David Minkin Foundation, The Frederick A. DeLuca Foundation, Echo Fine Properties, Bill and Kem Frick/The Frick Foundation, Inc., Morgan Glazar/Tom James Company, Paul and Sandra Goldner, Peter and Felicia Gottsegen/Gottsegen Family Foundation, Irwin and Janet Gusman, Thomas E. Harvey & Cathleen P. Black Foundation, Doris Hastings Foundation, John Herrick, Addison Hines Charitable Trust, George Hines, HSS Florida, IYC, Charles and Ann Johnson/The C and A Johnson Family Foundation, Barbara and William Karatz Fund/William Karatz and Joan G. Smith, Leonard and Norma Klorfine Foundation, Gary and Linda Lachman/The Lachman Family Foundation, Patricia Lambrecht, Tova Leidesdorf, Lugano Diamonds, The Honorable Bonnie McElveen-Hunter, The McNulty Charitable Foundation, David Moscow, NetJets, Palm Beach Design Masters, Patrick and Milly Park/Park Foundation, Nancy and Ellis J. Parker, III, PNC Private Bank, Lois Pope, Provident Jewelry, Ari Rifkin/The Len-Ari Foundation, Karen and Kenneth Rogers, Ronald Rosenfeld, David Schafer, Seth Sprague Foundation, Robin B. Smith, Kimberly Strauss, Dodie and Manley Thaler and the Thaler/Howell Foundation, Jerome and Carol Trautschold, Sieglinde Wikstrom/The Wikstrom Foundation, and The Ann Eden Woodward Foundation/James and Judy Woods. Programs are also sponsored in part by the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Arts and Culture, and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture.

Palm Beach Symphony is South Florida’s premier orchestra known for its diverse repertoire and commitment to community. Founded in 1974, this 501(c)(3) nonprofit arts organization adheres to a mission of engaging, educating, and entertaining the greater community of the Palm Beaches through live performances of inspiring orchestral music. The orchestra is celebrated for delivering spirited performances by first-rate musicians and distinguished guest artists. Recognized by The Cultural Council for Palm Beach County with a 2020 Muse Award for Outstanding Community Engagement, Palm Beach Symphony continues to expand its education and community outreach programs with children’s concerts, student coaching sessions and master classes, instrument donations and free public concerts that have reached more than 64,000 students in recent years. For more information, visit www.palmbeachsymphony.org.

Photo Credit: May Zircus

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Beyonce, Madonna, Shania among hottest summer

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It’s the busiest summer yet at Budweiser Stage

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It’s hard to believe, but in a few weeks, Toronto’s summer live music season officially begins when Janet Jackson opens the outdoor amphitheatre at Budweiser Stage on May 23.

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“Janet Jackson was a huge one for us to start with,” said Erik Hoffman, Live Nation Canada’s president for music.

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“It’s the busiest summer we will ever have (in 28 years),” Hoffman adds.

“So we will reach 70 shows in the amphitheatre proper at Budweiser Stage. We still haven’t finished announcing all of our events. Last year was a record year. This year will be bigger than that.”

Some of the hottest summer concert tickets are stadium shows — let’s hope the roof is open — at Rogers Centre ,including Ed Sheeran on June 17-18 (after he plays a club show at History on June 16), Beyonce on July 8-9, Pink with Brandi Carlile on July 24 and Guns N Roses on Sept. 3.

Beyonce reacts after winning the entertainer of the year award at the 50th NAACP Image Awards in Los Angeles, March 30, 2019.
Beyonce reacts after winning the entertainer of the year award at the 50th NAACP Image Awards in Los Angeles, March 30, 2019. Beyonce plays at the Rogres Centre on July 8-9, Photo by Mario Anzuoni / Files /REUTERS

“In terms of overall live music business, I feel like it’s better than (before COVID),” said Hoffman.

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“I think what happened during the pandemic, it reached another level in terms of (concertgoers)’ emotional attachment to music because we didn’t have anything live for a couple of years. I think it’s become that much more important to go and see shows. It feels like we’re now in high gear.”

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Other fast-selling summer concerts include such Budweiser Stage shows as The Cure on June 14, Shania Twain on June 23-24, Chris Stapleton on Aug. 17-18, Morgan Wallen from Sept. 14-16 and Scotiabank Arena shows such as Stevie Nicks on June 20, Madonna on Aug 13-14 and Peter Gabriel on Sept. 11.

Musician Ed Sheeran leaves after the first day of his copyright-infringement trial at Manhattan Federal Court on April 25, 2023 in New York City. Sheeran plays the Rogers Centre on June 17-18.
Musician Ed Sheeran leaves after the first day of his copyright-infringement trial at Manhattan Federal Court on April 25, 2023 in New York City. Sheeran plays the Rogers Centre on June 17-18. Photo by Michael M. Santiago /Getty Images

“Certainly anyone doing multiple nights at the amphitheatre or the stadium, or multiple nights at the arena — like Madonna or the iconic artists — are (doing) very well,” says Hoffman.

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“But the Stapletons and the Morgan Wallen and the Shania Twains were really, really hot shows (too). And then some of the other nostalgia (acts) like The Cure.”

As for summer festivals, some aren’t returning — like Field Trip — while others such as Drake’s OVO Fest have yet to be announced.

“I absolutely don’t speak for Drake but whatever he wants to do and whenever he wants to do it, we’re game, but I don’t know yet,” said Hoffman.

Axl Rose (left), lead singer of rock band Guns N' Roses, performs with Slash at Parken Stadium in Copenhagen, Denmark, June 27, 2017.
Axl Rose (left), lead singer of rock band Guns N’ Roses, performs with Slash at Parken Stadium in Copenhagen, Denmark, June 27, 2017. Guns N’ Roses plays Rogers Centre on Sept. 3. Photo by MADS JOAKIM RIMER RASMUSSEN / AFP / Files /Getty Images

There is, however, a new Queer festival called Lavender Wild that will take place outdoors on June 4 at RBC Echo Beach, right beside Budweiser Stage.

“(Live Nation Canada’s Festival Manager) Alex Simpson, she is a predominant member of the LGBTQ-plus community,” said Hoffman.

“She wanted to start a festival that celebrated queerness and so that’s exactly what she did. It’s a one-day boutique festival with music performances but also vendors from the community.”

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Nelly is also headlining the new Hot in Herre Festival on June 24 at Downsview Park and returning to Burl’s Creek in Oro-Medonte, Ont., — about 90 minutes north of Toronto — is the country festival Boots and Hearts from Aug. 10-13 with headliners Tim Hicks, Nickelback, Keith Urban and Tim McGraw.

In the meantime, here’s some of my highlights ( Budweiser Stage (BS), Scotiabank Arena (SA), Massey Hall (MH) and Fallsview Casino (FC).

A-LISTERS:

Louis Tomlinson, May 30, BS

Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds and Garbage, July 3, BS

Robert Plant and Alison Krauss, July 5, BS

Alicia Keys, July 14, SA

Snoop Dog, July 26, BS

Lionel Richie and Earth Wind Fire, Aug. 8, SA

Sam Smith, Aug. 11, SA

Rod Stewart, Sept. 2, OLG Stage, FC

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Sting, Sept. 5, BS

Eric Clapton, Sept. 10, SA

The Chicks, Sept. 18, SA

FESTIVALS:

Canadian Music Week (CMW), June 5-10

North By Northeast (NXNE), June 13-18

OLDIES (‘60s to ‘90s):

Crowded House, May 27, BS

Cheap Trick, May 27, OLG Stage, FC

Tom Jones, May 28, OLG Stage, FC

Justin Hayward (of the Moody Blues), May 28, Danforth Music Hall

Nancy Wilson’s Heart, June 7, Avalon Theatre, FC

Amanda Marshall, June 16-17, MH

John Mellencamp, June 19, MH

Teenage Head, June 23, El Mocambo

Santana, June 24, OLG Stage, FC

Tears For Fears, June 29, BS

LL Cool J, The Roots, June 29, SA

John Fogerty, June 30, OLG Stage, FC

Foreigner, July 25, BS

Peter Frampton, July 29, OLG Stage, FC

Boy George and Culture Club, Aug. 1, BS

Blue Rodeo, Aug. 26, BS

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Lynyrd Skynyrd and ZZ Top, Aug. 27, BS

Rob Zombie and Alice Cooper, Sept. 6, BS

Kenny Loggins, September 8, OLG Stage, FC

Duran Duran, Sept. 19, SA

COOKIN’ IT COUNTRY:

Dierks Bentley, June 1, BS

Eric Church, July 6-7, BS

Zac Brown Band, July 14, BS

ALT-STARS:

Hayden, May 27, MH

Paramore w/ Bloc Party, June 8, SA

Tegan And Sara, June 15, The Danforth Music Hall

Alexisonfire w/ Pup and Metz, June 16, BS

Weezer w/ Future Islands, July 4, BS

Billy Talent w/ Cypress Hill, July 8, BS

Sigur Ros, Aug. 14, Roy Thomson Hall

The National, Aug. 20, BS

City and Colour, Aug. 25, BS

Arctic Monkeys, Aug. 30 AND Sept. 1; BS

Smashing Pumpkins, Sept. 2, BS

Beck and Phoenix, Sept. 3, BS

Hozier, Sept. 19, BS

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Quick Thoughts on AI and Intellectual Property

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By Dean Baker

There has been a lot of concern in recent days about the impact of AI on people’s intellectual property. The latest AI programs screen millions of documents, songs, pictures, and videos posted to the web and freely grab any portion that seems to fit the commands given the program. As it stands, the creators of the material are not compensated, even if a large portion of their work appears in the AI product.

This raises serious questions about how AI will affect the future of intellectual property. To my mind, we should keep the focus on three distinct points:

  • Creative workers need to be compensated for their work;
  • Copyright monopolies may not be the best route, especially in a world with AI;
  • There are alternative mechanisms that we already use and which could be expanded.

Compensating Creative Workers

Starting with the first point, we have long recognized that a market that does not have some explicit mechanism for subsidizing creative work will underproduce creative work. People write, sing, paint, and do other creative work because they enjoy it, but we cannot expect to get as much of these products as society wants if we don’t pay people to do them. A musician or writer who has to spend eight hours a day bussing tables to pay the rent is not going to be able to devote themselves fully to developing their talents in these areas.

For this reason, we have long recognized the need for mechanisms to support creative work. This is the logic of copyright monopolies. By granting creative workers a legally enforceable monopoly on their work, we give them more of an opportunity to get compensated than if everything was immediately available in a free market. If a song could be immediately copied endlessly, with no compensation to the songwriters or musicians, they would get no compensation for any recorded work. The same would apply to writers, photographers, and many other creative workers.

Copyright monopolies can enable creative workers to get compensation, and possibly substantial compensation, if their work is popular. This is the logic of the clause in the Constitution allowing Congress to grant copyright monopolies.

It is important to recognize that the provision in the Constitution providing the basis for copyright quite explicitly describes it as serving a public purpose; it is not an individual right. The provision, Article 1, Section 8, clause 8, sets it out as a power of Congress:

“To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries.”

This appears alongside other powers of Congress, such as the power to tax and the power to declare war. The logic is quite clear: copyright is to serve the public purpose of promoting the “progress of science and art.” It is not a right of individuals included in the Bill of Rights along with freedom of speech or freedom of the press. This is an important point to keep in mind when assessing the merits of copyrights and alternatives in the AI age.

The Cost of Copyright Enforcement

Copyright enforcement has always been expensive, meaning that the costs of policing copyright, including legal fees and related costs, are high relative to the money actually given to creative workers. At the most immediate level, the creative workers who are ostensible beneficiaries of copyright monopolies often have to pay substantial sums to have their copyrights enforced.

The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Musicians (ASCAP), which is the major agent for collecting royalties for creative workers, reports that it pays out 90 percent of the money it collects in royalties. While that may sound pretty good, the money that a creative worker might have to pay to lawyers and agents comes out of this 90 percent. While creative workers are likely to need agents in any case, any legal fees they face will likely be associated with copyright issues. If legal fees associated with copyrights average 10 percent of their royalties for creative workers, then copyright related costs would be around 25 percent of their income from copyrights.

It’s also worth noting the sort of money involved. In 2021, ASCAP took in $1,335 million in royalty payments. The organization has 900,000 members, which means the average amount was less than $1,500 per person. Given the enormous skewing of these payments, with a relatively small number of creative workers getting a grossly disproportionate share of royalties, it is likely that the annual royalties for many ASCAP members are in the double or even single digits.

While copyright monopolies may mean little income for the vast majority of creative workers, they can impose large costs on society. This is largely due to how we have chosen to structure copyright law. In addition to actual damages, a person alleging copyright infringement is also eligible for statutory damages. These can run into the thousands, or even tens of thousands, of dollars. The person alleging infringement can also win attorney fees, which can run into the thousands of dollars as well.[1]

Spotify pays musicians between 0.3-0.5 cents per stream. Suppose someone posts infringing material on a website, which allows for 10,000 people to hear a copyrighted song. The actual damages in this case would be in the neighborhood of $30 to $50. Nonetheless, the infringer could end up paying many thousand dollars in damages and legal fees, an amount that could be easily hundreds of times the actual damage.

The Digital Millennial Copyright Act (DMCA) applies copyright law to the Internet. The DMCA requires Internet intermediaries, like Facebook or Twitter, to promptly remove content posted by third parties after being notified by a copyright holder, or their agent, of risk liability. According to several analyses, intermediaries typically err on the side of over-removal, taking down items which are arguably allowable under Fair Use, or where the infringement allegation does not come from someone who had a clear copyright claim.[2]

As a result, people go to great lengths to avoid inadvertently using copyrighted material. For example, anyone producing a movie or television show would thoroughly screen all the material to ensure that none of it is copyright protected. An independent producer would likely have to pay for insurance before a television station or streaming service would circulate their movie or show.

There also are undoubtedly many cases where material is altered due to ambiguities on copyright. Since there is no registration requirement, it can be almost impossible to determine if a copyright is applicable.

For example, if someone producing a documentary on the Sixties uncovered an old photograph, with no obvious commercial value, that would be useful for making a particular point, they would be taking a risk to include it. The person who took the photograph, or a family member, may be able to claim copyright ownership, and file a suit for an amount that exceeds whatever the filmmaker hoped to earn from the documentary.

Copyright can also impose a cost by obstructing the production of derivative works. There have been endless battles over people seeking to write fiction, parodies, songs, or other types of creative work based on famous fictional characters, such as Harry Potter or Sherlock Holmes. Arguably, we suffer a loss as a society by preventing these creative ventures. Fortunately, William Shakespeare’s work was no longer copyright protected when Tom Stoppard wrote “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead.”

There are also endless examples of copyright enforcement absurdities, such as when the Girls Scouts were threatened by ASCAP with a lawsuit for singing copyrighted songs around campfires without permission. (ASCAP later backed down and apologized.) More recently, Carol Highsmith, a photographer, got a cease and desist letter from Getty Images for posting her own photograph, which she had placed in the public domain and donated to the Library of Congress, on her own website.

There is a pretty much endless supply of these sorts of stories, but the point should be clear: copyright enforcement creates all sorts of issues that would not exist in a copyright free world, where basically all digital material could be obtained immediately at zero cost. Copyright is a way to support creative work, but arguably not a very good one. The Internet already raised the costs associated with copyright enforcement substantially. If we have to impose all sorts restrictions on AI, in order to protect copyrights, then the cost to society of copyright enforcement will rise further.

Alternatives to Copyright Monopolies for Supporting Creative Work

There are many other ways we can and do support creative work. The most obvious is with direct government subsidies. These subsidies are far more common in Europe than in the United States, but governments can pay out money to musicians, movie producers, writers and other creative workers. Even in the United States, we do commit relatively small amounts of money for this purpose through agencies like the National Endowment for the Arts.

However, having government agencies support creative work does raise political issues about what work should be supported. Fortunately, we have an alternative that already exists, even if it is not generally considered as a mechanism for supporting creative work.

The charitable contribution tax deduction is a way the government supports a wide variety of non-profit organizations. In many cases, such as orchestras, operas, art and culture programs, these contributions support people doing creative work. As it stands of course, the vast majority of these deductions are not for creative work, and the bulk of the benefit goes to high income people who both itemize on their tax returns and also are in the top marginal income bracket, which means the deduction would be worth more.

However, the charitable contribution tax deduction can serve as useful model. Instead of having a tax deduction, we could create a tax credit, say $100 to $200 per person. And, we could stipulate that the credit can only be used to support creative workers or organizations that support creative work. The latter could be organizations that commit themselves to supporting say, mystery writers or country music singers, which would serve as intermediaries for people who don’t want to use their credit for supporting specific individuals.

To be eligible to receive the funding, a person or organization would have to register in the same way that an organization has to register now with the I.R.S. to get tax exempt status. This would mean effectively saying what it is they do, as in write music, or play guitar. As is the case now, there would no effort to determine whether a particular individual or organization is good at what they do, just as the I.R.S. doesn’t try to determine if a church is a good church or a museum is a good museum. The only issue is preventing fraud, ensuring that they do what they claim to do. [3]

The other condition of eligibility is that workers would lose copyright protection for the time they are in the tax credit system and a substantial period (e.g. five years) afterwards. The point is that we only subsidize creative work once. If we pay the worker to produce a book or movie or song, we don’t have to pay them a second time by granting them a copyright monopoly.

The logic of having a ban on copyright protection for a period after being in the system is to avoid having people using the tax credit system as an effective farm system, where they develop a reputation and then join the copyright system. They would still have the option to change systems, but they would have to wait for a period of time.

A nice feature of this provision is that it is effectively self-enforcing. If a person breaks the rules and seeks to get a copyright for their work a year after they leave the tax credit system, they would find themselves unable to enforce the copyright. If they attempted to take legal action against someone for infringement, the defendant need only point to the fact that they had been registered in the tax credit system the prior year. Therefore, their copyright is not valid. (I discuss this system in somewhat more detail in chapter 5 of Rigged [it’s free].)

This sort of system could produce a vast amount of creative work that could be freely reproduced and transferred without any concerns about copyright. If AI programs wanted to scrape them to create new works, there would be no issue of compensation, the producers having already been compensated. A rule that could be applied (obviously this requires more thought) is some sort acknowledgement in an AI-produced work, much as any scholarly article includes a reference section for work that it draws on. This would prevent outright plagiarism by an AI program and also give credit to the creative workers who it relied upon for a derivative work. This is also something that presumably could be very easily programmed into any AI system.

I have heard people complain about the fact that this tax credit system would mean that creative workers would lose control over their work. For example, if some racist politician wanted to use their song at a campaign rally, they would have no way to stop them. This is true, but there are a couple of points worth keeping in mind.

First, even under the copyright system many creative workers sign over the rights to their work, so they already would not have the ability to prevent their work from being used in ways they found distasteful. Second, most people in society don’t have the ability to control what is done with their work. For example, jokes can’t be copyrighted. If someone writes a joke that a racist politician decided is the perfect line to start their campaign stump speech, there is nothing the joke writer can do about it, except complain. It’s hard to see why a musician or songwriter should have more right to control what is done with their work than a comedy writer.

Second, many people find their work used for purposes of which they strongly disapprove. Many of the physicists whose discoveries laid the groundwork for the development of the atomic bomb were pacifists. They were appalled that their work could be used to create a weapon of mass destruction. But there was nothing they could do about it. That seems a more serious complaint that a distasteful politician using a song without permission.

Copyright with a Tax Credit System

In principle, there is no reason that a tax credit system could not exist side by side with the copyright system. There could be many creative workers, which would likely include many well-established stars, who would opt to stay in the copyright system. In any case, there would still be a vast amount of material already protected by copyright.

As a general matter of principle, it is a good policy to respect property rights after they have been granted, even if it may have been a bad idea to grant those rights in the first place. For this reason, it would be appropriate to continue to respect existing copyrights. However, we can make an important change in the rules.

Copyright suits need not be eligible for statutory damages. If my neighbor knocks over my fence with their SUV, I can sue them for the cost of repairing my fence. I don’t also get statutory damages and usually would not be able to collect attorney fees. We don’t have to give this special status to those bringing lawsuits for copyright infringement.

This is likely to mean far fewer occasions for lawsuits for copyright infringement, which means fewer resources would be wasted contesting these suits and taking steps to prevent them. This could also make the copyright system less attractive relative to the tax credit system. If that turned out to be the case, that seems like a great outcome.

Time to Re-evaluate Copyright Monopolies, not AI

This is obviously a very superficial discussion of issues arising with AI. It also only a portion of the copyright related issues. For example, copyright also comes up with software and there are likely to be many instances where AI programs arguably infringe on copyrighted software.

However, the key point is that we should not treat our current rules on intellectual property as set in stone. When the Internet first became an important development in the 1990s, at the urging of the music industry, Congress rushed to pass the Digital Millennial Copyright Act, to ensure that copyrights would be enforced on the web. This limited the potential of the Internet as a means to freely transfer information, articles, books, music, and movies and other digital material.

Now we are hearing similar concerns about how AI will affect the value of copyrighted material. Rather than limiting AI, it might be more appropriate to reconsider copyright and determine whether it is still the best mechanism for supporting creative work. As I argue here, there are good reasons for thinking that is not the case.

[1] A provision in the Trans-Pacific Partnership would have required countries to have criminal penalties for copyright infringement.

[2] Note that the law with regard to copyright enforcement is the exact opposite of what it holds for third party content with regards to allegations of defamation. As a result of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, Facebook, Twitter and other Internet intermediaries can freely host defamatory material, and even profit from it directly when they sell ads, without any risk of legal consequences.

[3] It would be necessary to have rules to prevent simple scams. For example, in order to be able to receive the credit, there could be a requirement that a person gets at least $3,000. This would prevent any simple trading scheme where people exchange credits with each other. While it would still be possible have some pooling and kickbacks even with a $3,000 or similar size minimum, this would require a lot of work for relatively little money. Furthermore, it is much easier to organize a much larger kickback scheme with the current chartable deduction.

 

This post was previously published on cepr.net and under a Creative Commons license CC BY-ND 4.

 

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How ’90s Music Tech Paved the Way for Millions of

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Music from the ‘90s, dominated by the early years of hip hop and gritty grunge counter-culture might not immediately seem like a groundswell for transformative new gadgets and gizmos. However, despite its seemingly unpolished patina, a handful of crucial innovations spanning the decade have arguably done more to foster the current period of relatively cheap, on-demand, DIY musicianship than any other tools prior. An artist in 2023 armed with a MacBook, a decent pair of headphones, and a grand or two to spare can realistically produce a full-length album capable of rivalling a professional product from previous decades.

New tools like Digital Audio Workstations and audio interfaces slowly but surely gave artists the power to produce more work with less while major advances in high-impact technology like the world wide web and the MP3 format meant musicians could share their work with a far wider audience than ever thought possible. Transgressive new products from peer-to-peer file-sharing sites like Napster, meanwhile, paved the way for the streaming era and created an unquenchable consumer attitude for more and more content for less cost.

All combined, these advances in music tools and tech make the ‘90s a watershed decade that set music on a course still being felt today. Like all pivotal advances, each new tool brought its own complex set of tradeoffs for musicians, consumers, and the old guards of music industry titans. Here’s some of the most transformative music tech of the ‘90s and why it matters today.

Pro Tools and the Birth of the Digital Audio Workstation

How ’90s Music Tech Paved the Way for Millions of Bedroom Musicians

Possibly the single most crucial piece of technology responsible for transitioning music away from the limited confines of glitzy professional studios and towards everyday artists’ bedrooms was the introduction of the Digital Audio Workstation pioneered by Avid’s Pro Tools.

DAWs, now an industry standard and available in various forms (think GarageBand) to anyone with a laptop, essentially recreate a traditional studio’s tape machine, ​​mixing console, outboard gear, and other parts of a recording studio, and jam them all into a software package. That gives artists and producers the ability to record numerous audio tracks and seamlessly pepper-in effects like reverb, limiters, compression, and EQ previously only really available to studio professionals. When used correctly, musicians can record, mix and master a song from start to finish by themselves in a DAW.

Though a plethora of alternative DAWs exists today, Pro Tools, a multi-track interface designed by a pair of U.C. Berkeley graduates and released in 1991, was the game changer. Originally designed for Macintosh computers, Pro Tools offered artists a four-channel interface with the promise of studio-quality audio all wrapped up in a slick digital interface. DAWs that are now accessible to mass audiences were originally intended for professionals and had a prohibitive $US6,000 ($8,329) price point to match.

Like most new music tech, Pro Tools was originally written off by industry traditionalists for the early parts of the decade over fears it was less human or authentic than recording on tape in a traditional studio. That all started to change around halfway through the decade. Artists and producers were drawn to the software for its ease of use and speed for editing. Odelay, released by Beck in 1996 and Ricky Martin’s Livin’ La Vida Loca in 1999 were both reportedly recorded and produced entirely in Pro Tools and served as launching points for the industry, proving once and for all mainstream hit success could and would stem directly from DAWs.

Auto-Tune Set a New Standard for Sound

Dr. Andy Hildebrand accepts his technical Grammy in 2023. (Photo: Kevork Djansezian, Getty Images) Dr. Andy Hildebrand accepts his technical Grammy in 2023. (Photo: Kevork Djansezian, Getty Images)

If DAWs fundamentally transformed the way modern music was crafted, a product called Auto-Tune arguably did the most to alter the way modern music sounds. Like Google or Kleenex, Auto-Tune, just one of the numerous tools meant to “correct” the pitch of vocals and instruments, has entrenched itself as a generic noun and become ubiquitous in modern production. Nearly every song you listen to in 2023, whether it seems like it or not, almost certainly uses Auto-Tune or one of its copy-cats.

The inspiration for the tool oddly didn’t come from music at all but from the oil industry. Auto-Tune’s creator, a mathematician and musician named Andy Hildebrand reportedly conjured up the idea for the tools while developing advanced algorithms aimed at mapping underground surfaces for Exxon. In its most basic form, pitch correctors identify particular notes that are considered out of range of a particular key and force them back in line, a process that has some overlap with geological seismographs.

Hildebrand created Auto-Tune with subtlety in mind but more intrepid artists pretty quickly figured out ways to manipulate the new tool to create entirely “new” vocal sounds. By manipulating the speed with which notes are “corrected” to a desired pitch, artists learned to use the Auto-Tune feature to produce odd, robotic-sounding distorted effects. One of the first major examples of this effect presented itself in pop star Cher’s 1998 song Believe. Songwriters for years later would come to use the term “the Cher-Effect” to describe the process of pushing Auto-Tune to its limits. Rapper T-Pain would later take over that mantle with his own Auto-Tune drenched R&B, which he called “Hard&B.”

Auto-Tune and its inspired products have grown and evolved since their ‘90s debut to the point where they are now likely used in the majority of modern recordings, either subtly as a pitch-correcting tool or abstractly as a musical effect. Some artists, inspired by the T-Pain era, now inject Auto-Tune immediately into vocals, or in other cases, applied during live performances. For modern listeners, it’s not a stretch to say the AutoTune sound, if it can be described as such, is simply the baseline for what’s considered “normal” or expected for vocals.

Amplifier modelling

How ’90s Music Tech Paved the Way for Millions of Bedroom Musicians

The shift to digital workstations and MP3s fundamentally altered the course of all music, even those less traditionally associated with digitised formats. Amplifier modelling, what some purists originally tried to shrug off as, fake amps, allowed guitars, bassists, and really anyone plugging into an amplifier to bypass the need for physical amps and instead plug directly into a computer for sound.

Pedalboards and amp knobs were replaced by DAW plugins and on-screen sliders. That seemingly small change would have huge implications, essentially giving anyone with a computer the ability to access a world of different musical tones, effects, and amp styles, all at a fraction of the cost of their physical predecessors. Recording directly from a guitar into a DAW also lets musicians bypass the cumbersome and expensive process of micing up studio rooms and painstakingly searching for the ideal way to capture a particular sound in a live room. While that process inevitably loses some of the characters that gives a live performance its sense of presence, it simultaneously opened up recording to a near infinitely larger demographic of musicians who couldn’t afford or didn’t have access to recording studios. Amplifier modelling and direct guitar inputs are what make any number of bedroom pop indie bands possible.

The best amplifier modellers of the late ‘90, such as those released by the company Line 6 which offered a few dozen types of simulated tones, seem quaint compared to their modern-day predecessors like the Helix and Kemper Profile which are nearly indistinguishable from the real thing for all but the most trained ears. Many musicians are increasingly turning to these tools for live performances as well, trading out the vans full of amps for the convenience and dependability of precise, preset sounds.

MP3s killed the Walkman

Photo: Victor R. Caivano, AP Photo: Victor R. Caivano, AP

Everyday music listeners may not think much of it now, but the creation of the MP3 file in the late ‘80s and ‘90s may have played one of the single most important roles in widening music distribution for mass consumption of any single new technological innovation to date.

MP3 is actually an abbreviation for “MPEG Audio Layer III.” The MPEG part of that abbreviation is yet another abbreviation, this time referring to the Moving Picture Experts Group, an alliance of groups created by the International Organisation for Standardization and the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits and tasked with setting standards around digital media encoding. According to NPR, the concept behind the MP3 everyone knows today traces its roots to 1982 but it was deemed technically impossible until the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. The .mp3 file extension still used by many today traces its first birthday to July 14, 1995.

The MP3 was slow to take off in a world dominated by CDs and may actually owe some of its eventual ubiquity to a ‘90s internet pirate. In an interview with NPR, Karlheinz Brandenburg — referred to by some as the “father of the MP3” — said the process of “decoding” MP3s and making them usable for music listeners was essentially hijacked by an Australian student who purchased a professional encoding software for MP3 using a stolen credit card. He then allegedly broke down the software’s inner workings and posted them on a Swedish site with a read-me file titled, “freeware thanks to Fraunhofer.”

“He gave away our business model,” Brandenburg said in a 2011 interview with NPR. “We were completely not amused.” Brandenburg went on to say the MPEG groups tried to hunt down the leaker but the software had spread to a point where it was bigger than its creators could control.

“It was in ‘97 when I got the impression that the avalanche was rolling and no one could stop it anymore,” Brandenburg added. “But even then I still sometimes have the feeling like is this all a dream or is it real, so it’s clearly beyond the dreams of earlier times.”

The stolen business model would lay the groundwork for the widespread adoption of relatively tiny music files and portable MP3 players. Brandenburg may have missed out on a payday, but Apple made money hand-over-fist.

Napster and the Beginning of the Peer-to-Peer file-sharing era

Photo: Chris Hondros, Getty Images Photo: Chris Hondros, Getty Images

The introduction and eventual acceptance of MP3s paved the way for possibly the most significant and controversial ‘90s music innovations: Napster and peer-to-peer file sharing.

Over the course of fewer than three years, Napster would rise and fall, acquire millions of curious users, and upend ideas around music ownership and distribution for decades to come. Napter’s founder, a college student named Shawn Fanning, reportedly articulated his idea for the service on an internet message board in 1999. Referred to by many as a “glorified file browser.”

Napster worked by letting users see MP3 files available on other computers and access them. By doing so other users, or peers could then access files on their computers in turn. The result was a dramatic and radical expansion of the amount of music potentially available to any one listener that hurled the industry out of the limited confines of CDs.

“There was no ramp-up. There was no transition,” Downloaded director Alex Winter said in a 2013 interview with The Guardian. “It was like that famous shot from 2001: A Space Odyssey when the prehistoric monkey throws a bone in the air and it turns into a spaceship. Napster was a ridiculous leap forward.”

Napster launched in May 1999 and reportedly had 4 million songs available in circulation by October of that same year. By March 2000, the site had amassed over 20 million users and by the summer, some 14,000 songs were reportedly being downloaded every minute.

How ’90s Music Tech Paved the Way for Millions of Bedroom Musicians

Backlash from the record labels who felt like they were being denied compensation for songs they owned was strong and swift. Labels, led by the Record Industry Association of America, tried to bury Napster in a barrage of copyright lawsuits. Musicians, most notably Metallica and Dr. Dre. also launched their own heated, high-profile campaigns against the startup, but Napster wasn’t the only one feeling the heat. Individual Napster users, reportedly as many as ​​18,000 of them, were also sued, sometimes for simply accessing a handful of songs. The end came quickly for Napster. A court judge ruled in favour of RIAA and the site was given just 48 hours to start charging users for music.

Napster was acquired by a company called Roxio and then, in an odd string of events, eventually acquired by retailer Best Buy before being relaunched in 2016 in a short-lived effort to revive the band. Needless to say, that didn’t quite work out. Still, Napster’s legacy lives on in modern streaming services that cut deals with the record industry that realised it couldn’t compete with the bargain basement price of free.

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JoJo Says Music Biz Should Embrace AI-Generated

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92NY to Present AMERICAN MODERN OPERA COMPANY: THE

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92NY to Present AMERICAN MODERN OPERA COMPANY: THE ECHOING OF TENSES

The 92nd Street Y, New York (92NY), one of New York’s leading cultural venues, will present American Modern Opera Company: the echoing of tenses, on May 18, 2023 at 7:30pm ET in the Kaufmann Concert Hall. The concert will also be available for viewing online for 72 hours from time of broadcast. Tickets for both the in-person and livestream options start at $25 and are available at 92ny.org/event/american-modern-opera-company.

From the enterprising artistic collective and masters of interdisciplinary experimentation the American Modern Opera Company (AMOC*) – the New York premiere of a new work presented in collaboration with 92NY’s Unterberg Poetry Center.

the echoing of tenses is a new staged song cycle with music by composer Anthony Cheung and poems by seven of today’s most compelling Asian-American poets, including Jenny Xie, Ocean Vuong, Arthur Sze, Monica Youn, and others. Their texts, which are sung, spoken, and interwoven throughout the production, are interconnected through the themes of memory, identity, and diaspora. Performances by tenor Paul Appleby, violinist Miranda Cuckson, and pianist Conor Hanick.

AMOC* (American Modern Opera Company), founded in 2017 by Matthew Aucoin and Zack Winokur, builds and shares a body of collaborative work. As a group of dancers, singers, musicians, writers, directors, composers, choreographers, and producers united by a core set of values, AMOC* artists pool their resources to create new pathways that connect creators and audiences in surprising and visceral ways.

In 2022, AMOC* served as Music Director for the Ojai Music Festival-the second ensemble and first explicitly interdisciplinary company to hold the position in OMF’s 75-year history. Over the Festival’s four days, AMOC* offered 18 performances, eight world premieres, and six new theatrical productions. In the 2022/23 season, AMOC* premiered a new production of Harawi at Festival Aix-en-Provence, an affecting interpretation of Olivier Messiaen’s song cycle that breaks open its explorations of love and death into a newly physicalized and theatrical dimension. In the spring, the production will continue to DeSingel (Antwerp), Elbphilharmonie (Hamburg), and stARTfestival (Leverkusen).

The 2022-2023 season also includes the world premiere of Bobbi Jene Smith’s Broken Theater at UNC Chapell Hill and OZ Arts in Nashville; a chamber version of John Adams’s El Niño, conceived by Julia Bullock, at The Cathedral of St. John the Divine; and the New York premieres of Carolyn Chen’s How to Fall Apart at the Baryshnikov Arts Center and Anthony Cheung’s the echoing of tenses at the 92nd Street Y. Additional activities include an interdisciplinary performance residency at Brown University, a concert of new music written by AMOC* artists at the Clark Art Institute, and exhibition opening performances at Tina Kim Gallery (“House of the Inhabitant Who Refused to Participate,” curated by Charlap Hyman & Herrero) and Hauser & Wirth (Jenny Holzer’s “Demented Words”).

Composer and pianist Anthony Cheung writes music that explores the senses, a wide palette of instrumental play and affect, improvisational traditions, reimagined musical artifacts, and multiple layers of textual meaning. Described as “gritty, inventive and wonderfully assured” (San Francisco Chronicle) and praised for its “instrumental sensuality” (Chicago Tribune), his music reveals an interest in the ambiguity of sound sources and constantly shifting transformations of tuning and timbre. Representations of space and place are achieved through allusions in spatialization, orchestration, and recorded sound.

He has been commissioned by leading groups such as the Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Cleveland Orchestra (as the Daniel R. Lewis Young Composer Fellow), Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra, Scharoun Ensemble Berlin, and the International Contemporary Ensemble. His work “Lyra” was commissioned for the New York Philharmonic at the request of Henri Dutilleux, as part of the orchestra’s inaugural Kravis Prize for New Music. In addition, his music has been performed by the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Chicago Symphony Orchestra (on its MusicNOW series), Minnesota Orchestra, Ensemble Linea, Le Nouvel Ensemble Moderne, wild Up, eighth blackbird, and Dal Niente. His music has been programmed at festivals such as Ultraschall, Cresc. Biennale, Présences, impuls, Wittener Tage, Tanglewood, Aspen, Mostly Mozart, Transit, Heidelberger Frühling, Helsinki Festival and Musica Nova Helsinki, Centre Acanthes, Musica, and Nuova Consonanza.

His recordings include three portrait discs: Cycles and Arrows, with the Spektral Quartet, ICE, and Atlas Ensemble (New Focus, 2018), Dystemporal, with the Talea Ensemble and Ensemble Intercontemporain (Wergo, 2016), and Roundabouts, with the Ensemble Modern and Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra (Ensemble Modern Medien 2014). As a performer and advocate for new music, he was a co-founder of the Talea Ensemble, performing as a pianist and serving as artistic director.

The recipient of a 2016 Guggenheim Fellowship, Cheung has also won awards from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and ASCAP, and first prize in the Sixth International Dutilleux Competition (2008), as well as a Rome Prize from the American Academy in Rome (2012). He received a BA in Music and History from Harvard and a doctorate from Columbia University, and was a Junior Fellow at Harvard. He studied composition with Tristan Murail and Bernard Rands, and piano with Robert Levin and Paul Hersh. He taught at University of Chicago from 2013-20, and is an Associate Professor of Music at Brown University.

Admired for his interpretive depth, vocal strength, and range of expressivity, tenor Paul Appleby is one of the most sought-after voices of his generation. Mr. Appleby graces the stages of the world’s most distinguished concert halls and opera houses and collaborates with leading orchestras, instrumentalists, and conductors. Opera News writes, “[Paul’s] tenor is limpid and focused, but with a range of color unusual in an instrument so essentially lyric… His singing is scrupulous and musical; the voice moves fluidly and accurately.”

Paul Appleby’s calendar of the 2022-23 season includes the principal role of Caesar in the world premiere of Antony and Cleopatra by John Adams at San Francisco Opera conducted by Music Director Eun Sun Kim. Appleby reprises his internationally acclaimed title role portrayal of Bernstein’s Candide for the Opéra de Lyon in a new production by Daniel Fish led by Wayne Marshall and returns to the Los Angeles Philharmonic for performances of Girls of the Golden West under the baton of the composer, John Adams. No less impressive is the tenor’s international concert diary, which includes Bach’s Matthäus-Passion both with the New York Philharmonic and Hong Kong Philharmonic conducted by Jaap van Zweden as well as performances in Chicago with Music of the Baroque and Dame Jane Glover; a collaboration with the Met Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in a presentation of Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings; performances with the American Modern Opera Company; and a recital at the Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival.

A “fearless, visionary and tremendously talented artist” (Sequenza21), Miranda Cuckson delights listeners with her playing of a remarkably wide range of music and styles, from older eras to the newest creations. Known for her organic expressivity, dexterous virtuosity, imagination, insight, and love for music, she is sought after as a soloist and collaborator. A violinist and violist, she performs internationally at venues large and small, concert halls, and informal spaces.

As soloist these have included the Berlin Philharmonie, Suntory Hall, Casa da Musica Porto, Teatro Colón, Cleveland Museum, Art Institute of Chicago, Strathmore, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra’s Liquid Music series, National Sawdust, and the Bard, Marlboro, Portland, Music Mountain, Ojai, West Cork (Ireland), SinusTon (Germany), Wien Modern (Austria), and LeGuessWho and Soundsofmusic (Netherlands) festivals. Miranda made her Carnegie Hall debut playing Piston’s Concerto No. 1 with the American Symphony Orchestra. She recently premiered concertos written for her by Georg Friedrich Haas in Tokyo, Stuttgart and Porto, and by Marcela Rodriguez in Mexico City. Her upcoming solo performances include the Grafenegg Festival and San Francisco Performances.

Reflecting her deeply felt perspective as a multiethnic American, Miranda works with an array of artists from many backgrounds. Composers who have written major works for her also include Jason Eckardt, Reiko Füting, Michael Hersch, George Lewis, Wang Lu, Jeffrey Mumford, Aida Shirazi, Steve Lehman, Rand Steiger, Harold Meltzer, Dongryul Lee, and Stewart Goodyear. In addition to collaborating with many of today’s emerging artists, she has worked with celebrated composers including Dutilleux, Adams, Carter, Sciarrino, Boulez, Crumb, Iyer, Glass, Saariaho, Davidovsky, Ran, and Murail. She is a member of the interdisciplinary collective AMOC, and founder/director of non-profit Nunc. While remaining dedicated to the Western classical repertoire, Miranda has played countless concerts and premieres of new works, playing an inspirational role in bringing new creations more to the center of concert life.

She has released eleven albums to great praise, including the Ligeti, Korngold, and Ponce concertos; music by American composers Finney, Shapey, Martino, Sessions, Carter, Eckardt, Glass, Hersch; her ECM Records album of Bartók, Schnittke and Lutoslawski sonatas; Melting the Darkness, an album of microtonal and electronics pieces; and Nono’s La lontananza nostalgica utopica futura, which was named a Best Recording of the Year by the New York Times.

Miranda teaches at the Mannes School of Music at New School University. She is an alumna of The Juilliard School, having studied there from Pre-College through her doctorate, and she was awarded Juilliard’s Presser Award.

Pianist Conor Hanick is regarded as one of his generation’s most inquisitive interpreters of music new and old whose “technical refinement, color, crispness and wondrous variety of articulation benefit works by any master.” (New York Times) Hanick has recently been presented by The Gilmore Festival, the New York Philharmonic, Caramoor, Cal Performances, Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, and the Park Avenue Armory, and performed with the Seattle Symphony, Alabama Symphony, Orchestra Iowa, and the Boston Modern Orchestra Project. A fierce advocate for the music of today, Hanick has premiered over 200 pieces and collaborated with composers ranging from Pierre Boulez, Kaija Saariaho, and Steve Reich, to the leading composers of his generation, including Nico Muhly, Caroline Shaw, Tyshawn Sorey, Matthew Aucoin, and Christopher Cerrone. In the 22-23 season, Hanick premieres a new piano concerto by composer Samuel Carl Adams with the San Francisco Symphony and conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen; appears with soprano Julia Bullock at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence in Olivier Messiaen’s Harawi; and performs recitals at the Library of Congress, Hancher Auditorium, Ensemble Music Society of Indianapolis, the 92nd Street Y, and elsewhere. With the American Modern Opera Company (AMOC*), Hanick served as an artistic director of the Ojai Festival in 2022. He is the director of Solo Piano at the Music Academy of the West and serves on the faculty of the Peabody Institute and The Juilliard School.

2022/23 TISCH MUSIC SEASON

In this first season curated by 92NY’s new Vice President of Tisch Music Amy Lam, the season features 39 events, more than 20 92NY debuts, 31 premieres, and four 92NY commissions. The 22/23 season includes premieres of Joseph Schwantner’s guitar quintet Song of a Dreaming Sparrow, a song cycle by Anthony Cheung, and works by Laurie Anderson, Timo Andres, Marcos Balter, Christopher Cerrone, Nicholas DiBerardino, Reena Esmail, inti figgis-vizueta, John Glover, Ted Hearne, Fred Hersch, Stephen Hough, Jimmy López, Missy Mazzoli, Nico Muhly, Angélica Negrón, Mary Prescott, Caroline Shaw, Sarah Kirkland Snider, Darian Donovan Thomas, Scott Wollschleger, Pamela Z, and more.

Select Highlights:

This season marks the first time 92NY is presenting a fully integrated concert season across genres, including performances by Kate Baldwin, Joshua Bell, Regina Carter, Angela Hewitt, Larisa Martinez, Branford Marsalis,Kelli O’Hara, Eric Owens, Pepe Romero, Caroline Shaw, Sir András Schiff, Daniil Trifonov, and Jessica Vosk.

The World Premiere of a 92NY-commissioned piece from composer Jimmy López, performed by J’Nai Bridges and theCatalyst Quartet.

The New York premiere of Difficult Grace by cellist Seth Parker Woods and dancer Roderick George, presented in collaboration with Harkness Dance Center.

An in-depth two-day Julius Eastman retrospective featuring LA-based music collective Wild Up in three concerts, as well as exhibits, and panel discussions with Eastman friends and scholars examining the life of one of the 20th century’s most iconoclastic voices.

The Bach Collegium Japan, conducted by Masaaki Suzuki with baritone Roderick Williams

92NY’s signature series exploring the American songbook, Lyrics and Lyricists, continues to explore the best of Broadway, while also highlighting significant contributions to American culture by singer-songwriters across a variety of musical genres such as Marvin Gaye, Joni Mitchell, Nina Simone, the Mamas and the Papas, and more.

Two performances as part of an ongoing partnerships with The Curtis Institute of Music.

Jazz, which has been a staple of 92NY’s Tisch season since Thelonius Monk and Charles Mingus took to the stage in 1955, will be performed by world-class musicians like Branford Marsalis, Fred Hersch, and Regina Carter not just within the renowned Jazz in July series, but throughout the year.

The 92nd Street Y, New York (92NY) is a world-class center for the arts and innovation, a convener of ideas, and an incubator for creativity. 92NY offers extensive classes, courses and events online including live concerts, talks and master classes; fitness classes for all ages; 250+ art classes, and parenting workshops for new moms and dads. The 92nd Street Y, New York is transforming the way people share ideas and translate them into action all over the world. All of 92NY’s programming is built on a foundation of Jewish values, including the capacity of civil dialogue to change minds; the potential of education and the arts to change lives; and a commitment to welcoming and serving people of all ages, races, religions, and ethnicities. For more information, visit www.92NY.org.

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How is music playing a vital role in NFTs

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By Gaurav Dagaonkar

At this point, almost everyone would have heard of NFTs. They are a class of crypto assets with unique identification and metadata, signifying ownership and originality. The nature of NFTs means that they could potentially have the utility to solve existing problems and also serve as means of innovation without involving too much complexity. This fundamental nature also lends itself to certain solutions in the music industry.

Before we try to understand how NFTs play a vital role in music, let us understand some of the problems that currently exist –

  • It is tough for newcomers to make an impact.
    • Most up-and-coming musicians don’t have the capital to promote their music or fund their future projects.
  • Difficult for non-touring artists to make sustainable income off only traditional streaming platforms.
    • Most streaming platforms pay only about $0.003 per stream on average and to be able to make a decent income off streaming requires millions of streams which is not practical for a lot of indie musicians.
  • Illegal download of music aka piracy
    • Globally, music piracy costs the industry billions of dollars. And in India, the piracy rate stands at 67% which is double the global average rate.
  • Cancellation of tours/gigs due to the pandemic
    • Touring is the number one income-generating business for a lot of artists, and when that came to a standstill in 2020, a lot of musicians were severely hit by the same.

Now that we have understood what NFTs are and some of the problems faced by musicians and artists in the music industry, let’s take a look at some of the ways in which NFTs could have an impact and contribute towards solving the aforementioned problems.

There are several ways that NFTs benefit the music industry, both for the artists as well as businesses. Some of these are:

  • Music NFTs – This could be a song, an album, cover art, or even a music video. Artists can distribute and monetize their NFTs through platforms such as Opensea. Fans can support their favourite artists by purchasing such NFTs and in exchange, they get access to access to one-on-one conversations, exclusive previews of unreleased music, etc. Also, whenever the NFT gets traded after the initial sale, a cut goes to the original artist/creator of that NFT in the form of royalty.
  • Apart from selling music as such, nowadays, fans can also ‘invest’ in their artist’s music – this way it helps the artist raise money while fans also get to earn from the royalties generated from the particular project. Royal is one such platform.
  • Since each NFT holds a unique identity that is registered with the blockchain, replicating a song/album artwork becomes much more difficult and combats the age-old problem of music piracy.
  • Ticket NFTs – The ticketing business is an industry where a lot of fraudulent activity occurs and this is a problem that NFT could solve in a big way. For instance, tickets can be resold and the revenue can be split amongst several rights holders. This way, the tickets can potentially bring in more revenue compared to the one-time payment that takes place with traditional ticketing. Also, the usage of NFTs as tickets helps organisers track.   

All in all, NFTs can play a pivotal role in giving artists a mechanism to track things and also increase their revenue streams. With the advent of newer technologies, artists are not only able to monetize their music but also connect with their fans on a deeper level, which was not easy earlier. And it is not only the artists that benefit but also companies that are in the business of ticketing, streaming, etc. At a fundamental level, what NFTs will pave the way for is more transparency & accountability, thereby opening up new channels for growth and also helping reduce piracy and other nefarious activities that currently exist.

The author is co-founder,CEO, Hoopr

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Greenberg Traurig Promotes Four Entertainment

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Global law firm Greenberg Traurig has elevated attorneys Ann Brigid Clark, Paul Sarker and Jared S. Welsh to shareholder in its Entertainment and Media Practice, and promoted Alana C. Kirkland to of counsel.

The foursome brings a wide variety of expertise to their enhanced roles.

Clark (above, left) focuses on transactional entertainment, media, and intellectual property matters for individual artists and companies, with a focus on motion picture, television and new media content.

Sarker (above, right) represents entertainment, sports and media clients in such areas as mergers and acquisitions, television and digital distribution deals, licensing, endorsements, and union and guild matters.

Welsh (below, left) counsels entertainment and digital media companies and creators on intellectual property matters, with a focus on complex transactions and digital distribution deals for music.

Kirkland (below, right) targets media and intellectual property transactions and the licensing of music, videos, and other entertainment content – helping clients capitalize on streaming services.

“Our entertainment practice is broad and interdisciplinary, which is why Ann, Paul, Jared, and Alana were elevated,” said Bobby Rosenbloum, chair of the firm’s global Entertainment & Media Practice. “Here in Atlanta, Jared and Alana have demonstrated their continued commitment to providing legal service to our clients in the fields of digital music licensing; film/TV music offerings; name, image and likeness; and a variety of other areas.”

Added Daniel H. Black, vice chair of Greenberg Traurig’s global Entertainment & Media Practice and chair of the West Coast Entertainment & Media Practice: “Many of our entertainment clients pursue multiple business avenues, some traditional and some not. Ann’s uniquely comprehensive practice, which often finds her shepherding motion picture and television projects from inception to the screen, means she is capable of providing her clients with guidance on a wide variety of issues both here in Los Angeles and globally,”

“Paul consistently delivers tailored legal service to help our clients successfully pursue their varied interests by leveraging his interdisciplinary skillset,” said Barbara Meili, vice chair of the firm’s global Entertainment & Media Practice and chair of the New York Entertainment & Media Practice.

While Greenberg Traurig did not disclose all the clients that the four promoted attorneys would be working with, the firm shared that these include NFT collective Gutter Cat Gang, New England Sports Network, YES Network (Yankees and Nets), and videogame/e-sports company Hi Rez Studios.

Greenberg Traurig’s attorneys, including Black and Rosenbloum, have long figured prominently in Variety’s annual Legal Impact Report. The firm’s Entertainment and Media Practice, with offices in multiple cities, focuses on music, motion pictures, television, sports, internet, digital media, publishing and theater.



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Award-Winning Staump Music School Is Helping

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Award-Winning Staump Music School Is Helping Children Beyond The Notes As Students Learn Skills That Last A Lifetime – Music Industry Today – EIN Presswire


















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