I just want to put this out there:

If a song was written by a composer who has been dead for at least 50 years (I believe that's the rule), the songs of the composer in question are now considered "in the public domain;" no one technically owns them. This site ( http://www.pdinfo.com/) explains it better than I can.

So basically it would be a good idea to find a song that everyone knows, but falls into the category of "public domain" so there is no issue whatsoever if you want to have your own version in the film. (note that doesn't mean the recordings but the compositions)

Corax,

I'm a bit late responding to your Public Domain (PD) post. The only time you do not have to clear the rights to a PD composition is if you create a new derivative work. If you use an existing recording/derivative work created by someone other than yourself or a composer you hire where you retain the rights, you will have to clear the master recording rights.

If the author of this new derivative work copyrighted their work, you will have to clear the sync rights with them as well. If they assigned this derivative work to a publisher, you will have to clear the sync rights through their publisher.

There are many times when the derivative work does not get copyrighted and does not get assigned to a publisher. In this case, you will only have to clear the master recording.

I hope this clears up the public domain misunderstanding.

Dominique Preyer
Music Supervisor
e-mail: ?url="mailto:dominique?spincyclefilms.com"? dominique?spincyclefilms.com ?/url?
Website: ?url="http://www.spincyclefilms.com/dp/home.htm"?Music Supervision ?/url?