BBC documentary in 6 parts about Harry Partch, an ‘idiosyncratic’ composer and instrument maker who devised his own microtonal musical scales:

I’ve just released a new low-cost downloadable royalty-free collection of music aimed at film and documentary makers. Royalty-Free Film & Documentary Music Vol. 1: Piano & Atmospheric Beds is a collection of specially composed dark piano and atmospheric ambient soundscapes ideal for film and documentary visuals that need a suitably dark and atmospheric musical background. The album is 45 minutes long and can be bought from my download shop: Royalty-Free Film & Documentary Music Vol. 1: Piano & Atmospheres Purchase of the mp3 album download grants the user a license to use the music in any film, documentary or other visual project without the need for any further payment. So once you’ve bought this, you can use it in as many of your film and documentary projects as you like, whether it’s for festivals, trailers, or broadcast. The idea was to provide film and documentary makers with music that hopefully has more of an atmospheric or cinematic feel to it than stock library music but to keep it good quality at a reasonable price. Listen to a preview of some of the tracks below:

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I expect there’ll be more volumes to come in future. I’ve got some ideas for themes but I’ll wait and see what I can fit in around other projects.

I’ve just been made aware of a website that has taken complete sections of code and content from my own website without even bothering to change the layout. It’s actually a verbatim copy of my content right down to my list of influences and favourites. The only thing changed is my name to hers.

I’ve decided to remove the name and website of the guilty party as she’s now removed my stolen content which was my main issue (though I do have saved copies of the site in case it comes to light again). An apology would have been nice rather than the lies I was given but there you go. And I will be keeping an eye out – if I catch her doing anything like that again, I guarantee this will become a legal matter.

This isn’t the first time it’s happened. A few months back there was a French composer who did exactly the same thing, stealing the complete layout and content of my website. As soon as my solicitor began threatening legal action he took it straight down.

To be honest I’m getting a bit pissed off with people stealing from the hard work I put in to this website. I’ve got better things to do than monitoring the web to see who’s passing themselves off as me today. Like writing music. The next time I find any kind of copyright infringement on any of my work, it’s going straight to litigation.

This sort of copyright plagiarism is unfortunately rife these days. I know of several other musicians who’ve experienced similar situations to a more extreme degree, with people stealing their actual music and trying to claim it as their own. There are steps you can take if you’ve experienced copyright or IP infringement. Here’s a couple of useful sites or get in touch and I’ll see if I can offer any advice:

http://www.plagiarismtoday.com/

http://lorelle.wordpress.com/2006/04/10/what-do-you-do-when-someone-steals-your-content/

Writer Harlan Ellison draws some parallels about (not) working for free that many media composers will be familiar with.