ABSTRACT
Over the course of the chapter I will argue that these norms, and the laws which enshrine them, are flawed. Not only does copyright arbitrarily privilege one form of musical production (Western, compositional) at the expense of another (non-Western, traditional), but it sets up on dubious grounds a system of value in which performance is inferior to composition. As well as being unfair, these distinctions fail to take account of an increasingly important characteristic of music in the twentieth century and after; the renewed convergence of the functions of writing and performance through techniques like improvisation, repetition-variation and sampling. Musicians who want to adopt these methods are strongly disadvantaged by the structure of rights. Lastly, copyright does not provide an equitable system of reward. Above all, it has favoured big corporations over the supposed beneficiaries of the system, music makers. Copyright also accentuates inequality between music makers, especially between stars and small-time music makers. In what follows I will investigate these issues, examining what's wrong with copyright from the musician's point of view. And in the conclusion I'll ask how copyright might be reformed, both for the benefit of music makers, but also for the social good more generally.
