Trying to contact a score contributor to acknowledge their score

[Steve Martin]

Hi to the forum,

I have used part of a score created by Alan Chen who re-typed the Flight of the Bumble Arrangement. https://imslp.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_Tsar ... ,_Nikolay)

According to the Licence which is a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 [tag/del], and the licence asks me to "Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use"
I'm guessing that one the score I provide his name, and the link to the licence. and also give details about any changes I made to the score.
As I only used part of the score that should not be a problem to acknowledge, I can give those details. But, do I have to just give his Name, in this case 'Alan Chen', and that is all in regard to acknowledging him, or do I have to provide a link to him as a means for people to contact him on the score also? I cannot seem to find a link to him to contact him - but is that necessary? So, obviously I give his name, but do I have to give some kind of link to a website of his?

Thanks if someone can please help me out here.

Steve Martin

[bicinium]

"Any reasonable manner" should include just mentioning the name Alan Chen, no contact details or link to the license required. Creative Commons licenses are intended to make redistribution possible without depending on the original rights holder.

Insofar as Chen's typeset is just a faithful typeset without any new, original musical additions (ostensibly the case, but never guaranteed), and depending on what you're using it for, attribution may not even be required. If you reproduce parts of his score visually, then that's protected by the creative commons - attributions license. Performances and recordings using the score to play from, or retypesets and arrangements based on it, might not be, because technically no creative material by Chen went into your product (it was all pure Rimsky-Korsakov). Still credit Chen for courtesy and authenticity's sake but it may not be legally required in that instance.

[Steve Martin]

Hi Bicinium,

thank you for your reply. I didn't realize you had answered, so I actually private messaged someone else about this, until I realized that I had a private message from you. Yes, I'll think about acknowledging his contribution, as in the end, I scrapped my piece, and started the orchestration again based on the Piano Vocal score which is Public Domain on the imslp. The only similarity between the Alan Chen score and mine is the notes, and that I used the same pizz performance of the accompanying chords as in his [well, really, Rimsky Korsakov's orchestration], as I did in my re-scoring of it based on the piano vocal score in which I don't have to acknowledge any use of.

thanks again for getting back to me and giving advice on this.

best regards,

Steve

[alan850627]

Hey Steve and all,

I made an account here just to respond:

Insofar as Chen's typeset is just a faithful typeset without any new, original musical additions (ostensibly the case, but never guaranteed), and depending on what you're using it for, attribution may not even be required.

The typeset full score was based on a set of parts published by Chester Novello at the time (Wise Music now). The set only came with a piano conductor score, but based on the rehearsal numbers starting at 156, I could tell the parts came from the opera itself. With that, I'm confident what's there is, to the best of my knowledge, a faithful typeset without any new, original musical additions (well, 10 years ago -- the best a teen could do, as you could see from my hilarious choice of font ).

If I get some time, I will scan and upload those Novello parts in the next few days...
Thanks for taking an interest in the score!

Best,
Alan

[Steve Martin]

Hi Alan,

I just found your post. Thank you so kindly for getting back to me. I had no idea that you had responded, I may have received an email saying that you had, but if that's the case I missed it as I have a pretty full gmail inbox!! I just realized after reading the post that it was you who uploaded the Rimsky bumble bee score. As I've used the score for part of an arrangement [just the opening 12 bars I believe], I'm just hoping that the score that you based this on was a public domain score - I just want to be safe and not be sued from anyone!!

If everything is fine, could you please tell me how you would like to be acknowledged in my arrangement, as it will be published soon. I'll be publishing it as a pdf score, probably selling it on a friends music site, or some other way.

thanks again for getting back to me here. I'm sorry I took so long, I never knew you had posted until I decided to check the forum today!
My apologies!

best regards,

Steve

[Steve Martin]

Hi Alan,

thanks again for that previous email, I went to the IMSLP page where your score was hosted, and found all of the parts. It looks like they are pretty defintely in the Public domain, so there is no longer any worry for as your score was based on these parts.

I hope you can get back to me and let me know how you'd like me to acknowledge your score being used as part of the arrangement/composition I've created.

many thanks,

Steve.

[alan850627]

Hi Steve,

No need to acknowledge me in this case, since you're not reproducing the typeset in any form, simply its contents, which is public domain.

All the best,
Alan

[Steve Martin]

Hello Alan,

thank you for getting back to me, and thanks also for your reply. As long as that is ok with you then.

best regards,

Steve Martin