# Hallelujah?



## breakup

Lenard Cohan wrote Hallelujah and several people have recorded it and posted on YouTube. Cloverton has taken the music and written words for it that tell the Christmas story, almost completely changing the words. The copyright owner (presumably Lenard Cohan or his agent) have been objecting to YouTube and some of the posts have been muted. Since the recording uses different words it is not the same song but it does use the music. Should the copyright owner be able to object and have the videos muted? 

Note, in the past many composers have taken the music of other composers and composed new music based on it. I have several copies of music like that, in particular Rachmaninoff's Rhapsody on a theme of Paganini.


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## Art Rock

Of course Cohen has the right to the melody.

Richard Strauss blundered into this by using what he thought was the melody of an Italian folk song (funiculi funicula) in his tone poem Aus Italien. The composer of that song, Luigi Denza, filed a lawsuit against Strauss and won; Strauss was forced to pay him a royalty fee.


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## breakup

Did Cohen contact Cloverton and request a royalty fee, or is he just objecting to the use of his music?

The other question is, did Cloverton try to contact Cohen or Sony and make some effort to obtain the rights to the music?


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## breakup

I found this while searching for any record of a dispute,

"Rob Reilly2 days ago
Musicians have been writing new lyrics to old melodies for centuries and nobody ever called it stealing. Examples include "The Star Spangled Banner" to an old English pub song "To Anacreon in Heaven"; "My Country Tis of Thee" to "God Save the King"; and Elvis Presley's "Its Now or Never" to the Italian song "O Sole Mio", "Love Me Tender" to the antebellum song "Aura Lee", "I Can't Help Falling in Love With You" to an old French love song "Plaisir d'amour", and "Wooden Heart" to a German beer hall polka "Muss I Denn".
Standup comics have parodied Cohen's lyrics and turned it into a joke about drunkenness (it goes like this, you chug a fifth, you barf, you fall into a ditch).
*A copyright violation would be anyone making money off this. Cloverton offered this performance as a freebie to their fans, and has apparently not made any attempt to collect any money anywhere for this.* Sony would be smart to realize they have a hit and there is money to be made here, and to work up a business deal with Cloverton. Cloverton would be smart to delete the last remaining Cohen lyrics and substitute more of their own; then the deal with Sony would be about only the melody, probably easier to come to an agreement.
If objections to this are due to it being about Jesus, take it up with the apostles. If you think any part of the story was a big fat lie, remember they were eyewitnesses and most of them were killed for proclaiming it was true. Would you die for something if you knew it was a lie?"

It seems that Cloverton has offered the song for sale and it trying to make money from it.


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