IMSLP Forums

Today's Sorabji piece is quintet No. 1
https://www.worldcat.org/title/quintet- ... 1101217518
Here it is on WorldCat (1923)
I have a bad scan of the publication and a copyist's manuscript. Although the copyright date on the score is not visible in the bad scan, the Sorabji Archive's scan (which I do not have, but is 10 pounds for a pdf) seems to be better. You can view the first page of that scan as a sample here: http://www.sorabji-archive.co.uk/sample ... p1_pub.pdf
It agrees with WorldCat in saying 1923.
One last thing: can I also upload the copyist manuscript?

Alright go ahead. Please be quick.

https://imslp.org/wiki/Piano_Quintet_No ... _Shapurji)
Done!

The copyist's manusript copy was not published at the time of publication of the engraved edition and so should not be uploaded here.

It was first published in 1923 so its public domain in the USA.

The publication appeared in 1923 but the copyist's copy was never published until it was issued by The Sorabji Archive in the latter 1980s so, as previously mentioned, it should not be uploaded to IMSLP.

A copyist manuscript (if done before 1923) is not copyrightable unless the work itself was published under a publishing house which happened in 1923, which has a stamp on the engraving as Copyright 1923 as I already stated provided by Wih3lm above, so the copyist manuscript is also in the public domain in the United States.

Remember in the USA, first publication means that all extant editions, including the copyist manuscript of the same setting with no changes musically is in the public domain.

The work remains under copyright in Canada and the EU.

Update: I just took a look at the copyist manuscript once more and on the second page of the score towards the bottom, it says in handwritting: "Copyright 1921 by the composer", meaning it actually was not first published in 1923 but in 1921, meaning this is for certain in the public domain in the USA. So this is now case closed since the composer himself copyrighted it that year.

A composer is entitled to copyright his/her own work and/or a copyist's copy/edition thereof without publishing it or having it published. The engraved published score of Piano Quintet No. 1 is indeed dated 1923 but the copyist's copy was not made available until the late 1980s and would not be available for upload now had we not published it! We do not know what became of the autograph ms. of this work.

The composer copyrighted all of his works but very few of them were actually published by 1925.

If the score has written Copyright 1921 on the score, its in the public domain, you can't just say that it was withheld from public release until the 1980s if it was published beforehand by either the composer himself (which the copyist manuscript does say) which would be in the public domain in the United States. Composers are allowed to Self Publish a work and this is pretty clear here already. If your referring to the rule in the European Union about dissemination to the public being at least 25 years since publication, this is certain more than 25 years, especially by the 1980s now it would be way more than 25 years, that does not apply to United States Copyright Law where no such law exist there, its based on First Publication of the work itself. Since it was FIRST published before 1927 now, the copyist manuscript is in the public domain the United States and ONLY in the United States.

OK a little more info I got from another copyright expert, the copyist manuscript has a defective notice on it and you cannot claim the Manuscript vs. the Engraved Edition as two separate publications (which is first publication here) in the USA, thereby its in the public domain even if its released later for USA Copyright Law. Thereby its in the Public domain in the United States.

I'm an IMSLP copyright reviewer.

In this case, it's very simple. US copyright law applies to works, not to specific copies of works. A handwritten manuscript and a published edition which contain the same material are copies of the same work, according to US copyright law.

This work was published in 1923. Accordingly, it is in the public domain in the United States. This applies not only to the edition published in 1923 but also to other editions of the work, unless they contain substantially new content which would be original and significant enough to qualify for a copyright. The manuscript does not contain significantly different material for US copyright purposes — it is a copy of the same work. So even if it were first made available to the public in the 1980s, this wouldn't matter — US copyright (in this era) counts from the year of work publication, and the work was published.

This is to say, it doesn't actually matter whether or not this manuscript was published in 1921, or whenever — the work's copyright has expired.

Of course, this work can remain in copyright according to the laws of countries besides the United States, but that's another point entirely.

On the basis of what I read above, it might be argued that the original manuscript of this work would also be in the public domain in US (although, as its whereabouts are unknown and location undocumented, it seems a fair bet that, a century later, it is now lost). A further point is that a new typeset edition of the quintet is in preparation so, when published, would that also be in the public domain in US even though only recently prepared, simply by reason of being an edition of a work that had been published in the early 1920s? - and, if so, where would that leave the editor's copyright?

Doing a new Engraving now would be under copyright in the USA simply because its a new edition, the Manuscript as we said already is not a new edition done later, it was done around the same time as the 1923 engraving and whoever did the engraving is also the editor of the engraving. A copyist does not count because he did not add anything musically significant as we pointed out already.

In the case of the piano quintet we cannot be sure what the copyist might have added or subtracted (albeit as sanctioned by the composer should either case pertain) or even gotten wrong because the original ms. is not known still to exist; there are certainly errors in the published score, as is the case to greater or lesser degree with all of Sorabji's early published works.

For the record, the original mss. of five other early Sorabji score publications seem also to be missing; although only one of these is known to have a copyist's copy, that copy has been determined by the person who recently made a new typeset edition of it that it was made at the composer's request not for the benefit of the work's publication but to be given to its dedicatee.