plime.com : Organist gets royalties for adding solo to Whiter Shade of Pale

Organist gets royalties for adding solo to Whiter Shade of Pale

Matthew Fisher, former organist for Procol Harum is awarded 40% of royalties for adding the organ solo (to Whiter Shade of Pale even though the song was already composed by the time he joined the band and his solo contribution is about 96% of Bach's Air on a G String picked by 2manyusernames 2 years ago

tags procol harum bach solo organ whiter shade

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26	2manyuse...

2 years ago

This is part of the problem with judges. They are invested with too much power with very few, if any checks or balances (unless one is wealthy enough to keep up the appeals)

The song was already written
His solo wasn't even original. Okay, it was original but was so heavily influenced by Bach writings that if they weren't in the public domain, the song never would have been released.

The precedent this brings is huge. Every song written where there was a riff added by a guitarist, bass player, drummer or whatever can now be brought into court and fought over royalties.

The solo is a big part of the song, I admit that.
To say that it justifies 40% of the royalties and song writing credit is ridiculous

Still I will admit that this case might be different in that the solo is what made the song so popular. Without the solo, it just wouldn't have been quite as good. So the case might not be 100% ridiculous, but it is pretty close to 100%

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