Welcome to the Free Music Archive (Beta)

In celebration of Creative Commons' tenth anniversary, members of CC's European affiliate network have put together an awesome mixtape of their 20 favorite Creative Commons–licensed songs by artists in 20 European countries.

This music runs the gamut from electronic to folk to classical, and yet, there's something cohesive about it all. The entire album rings with obsessively creative complexity; that is, it's the kind of thing you can imagine a bunch of CC affiliates listening to while having a heated discussion about license compatibility.

Most people reading this blog post are probably familiar with Creative Commons. If not, here's a refresher in Swedish. Creative Commons is committed to making it easier for creative people to share their work with each other. If you like what you hear, support the artists, and consider supporting CC too.

For more information, read this blog post by CC Portugal's Teresa Nobre about how the project came together.

The song Happy Birthday to You (HBTY) has a story to tell, and it’s not wishing you to have a good one on this, the anniversary of your birth. The most recognizable song in the English language – a simple six notes and words - is owned by Time Warner, who will charge you ten grand to legally sing the four verses in a public place like a school or restaurant. But the history of how HBTY turned into a two million dollar a year corporate earner is the interesting part. It’s a case study in the copyright-by-fiat strategy that has recently proven so popular with corporate minions and robots. They allege intellectual ownership where none exists, and they often get away with it.

There are many ways to right this wrong. You could challenge HBTY’s dubious copyright in court, as long as you’re prepared for a foe like Time Warner. Or you could try to shame Time Warner by urging innocent birthday revelers to request permission for every innocent public “performance” of the song. Both are worthy endeavors, but neither one sounds like much fun.

No, for our purposes here, we’ll encourage you to unseat (or at least unsettle) “Happy Birthday to You” from it’s cultural throne by composing possible replacements. The Free Music Archive Happy Birthday contest seeks a few new Happy Birthday songs that are simple and catchy, with great earworm potential (remember: HBTY uses only six notes!) that can be sung in restaurants, bowling alleys, even in TV shows and movies – free of charge. Together, let us shake “Happy Birthday” from it’s fortified cultural throne, and replace it with a melody that the children can sing without fear of being served.

The three top entries will be all dressed up and distributed to the most powerful media companies on earth with colorful, Ross Perot-style financial incentive charts encouraging the recipients to better their bottom line by using one of these shiny new Happy Birthday replacement tracks.  WFMU will organize and pay for the digital and physical mailings of the three winning tracks to the luckiest people on earth-  any media or public organization who might have need for new birthday songs - movie studios; theater troupes, restaurant chains; sport leagues, scouting associations, youth groups; minor league baseball teams, major league Jai Alai squads, bowling alleys and we’ll also send the track to music journalists, bloggers and radio stations to help get the word out and cement the new songs into the cultural subconscious.

Ready to compose the next great Birthday song for the cake-eating masses? Here's where you can learn more about the judges, official rules and how to submit your work.

And here’s more background, if you hanker for more historical details on the very shaky copyright in question. The familiar melody for “Happy Birthday to You” was borrowed from other mid-19th century songs such as Horace Waters' "Happy Greetings to All" and "Good Night to You All," (published 1858) and also "A Happy New Year to All" and "A Happy Greeting to All" (published 1888). All four of these songs had that same six-note melody, and from the 1850’s to the 1880’s those six notes were reapplied to any number of greetings songs, some of which made it into published songbooks of the day.

Two esteemed Kentucky Kindergarten teachers named the Hill Sisters use this same melody with the lyrics “Good Morning to All” and used that version in their classes to greet their students, even publishing it in their own 1893 pamphlet. But over the years, somebody – who, we will never know – modified the lyrics to now public domain “Good Morning to All” with the present birthday lyrics. Were these 19th century wordsmiths The Hill Sisters themselves? Their students?  A class parent? The school janitor? We will never know. But the modified “Good Morning to All” caught on.

If fact, it caught on so much that Western Union used the song for their first singing telegram in 1933. But when the Irving Berlin musical “As Thousands Cheer” made use of the song later that same year, the forgotten Hill sister Jessica sprang into gear like a depression-era Gloria Allred.  Jessica got legal assistance from the Summy Company, who registered for copyright in 1935, crediting the song’s authors as Preston Ware Orem and Mrs. R.R. Forman, whoever they were. Time Warner purchased the Summy Company in 1998, and Edgar Bronfman Jr and friends purchased Warner Music Group in 2004. The song has been scheduled to enter the public domain a few times, but copyright term extensions have now delayed that date to 2030 at the earliest. 

Which is how we got to where we are now – living in a world in which restaurant chains invent their own replacement birthday songs, rather than break the law or pay thousands of dollars in licensing. A world that’s more like a dystopian hellscape, frankly, in which countless movies and TV shows sing “For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow” rather than fork over the estimated ten grand in licensing fees. Take a look at the video to see just how bad the problem really is. And then create your own Happy Birthday song, either with a melody of your own creation, or a reworked public domain melody with new lyrics. Keep it simple. And let’s put the Happy back into Birthdays, and take the Cease and Desist out of ‘em.

Contest rules |  How to Submit your Song

ZOO is one of experimental rock retainers from Yogyakarta, Indonesia. In their earlier years, Zoo was playing noisy, fast, mathematical pattern a la Boredom, Melt Banana or Hella that can be found on their mini album "Kebun Binatang". In their first full album “Trilogi Peradaban", Zoo began to combine textures of western experimental rock and the concept of Indonesian tribal music. This debut was released in limited number (100 copies) of Boxset consists of three CDs with a packaging made out of wood. This second album was also released to be downloaded for free in digital format by Yes No Wave Music and distributed on CD by Australian label Tenzemen and DualPlover.

After almost three year break, towards the end of 2012, Zoo comes back with a second full album called "Prasasti". This album contains 11 composed songs and 11 improvised songs. Here, Zoo ripens the concept that they started in "Trilogi Peradaban". The lyrics are using various traditional languages in Indonesia; Aceh, Bugis, Palembang, Dayak, Lombok, Kawi, Sulawesi Tengah, Banjar, and Minang. Not only that, Rully the vocalist/songwriter creates an alphabetical script called Zugrafi.

The packaging of "Prasasti" is made out of 1.7 kg granite, with the band name and album title carved on a stainless steel plate. Inside the packaging is also a sheet of recycled paper containing screen-printed lyrics and song credits. This packaging is only available for 200 copies, hand-numbered on the sleeve. The digital format was released for free download by Yes No Wave Music.

The Free Music Archive wants to wish Creative Commons a Happy Birthday with a song. But there's a problem. Although "Happy Birthday To You" is the most recognized song in the English language and its origins can be traced back to 1893, it remains under copyright protection in the United States until 2030. It can cost independent filmmakers $10,000 to clear the song for their films, and this is a major stumbling block hindering the creation of new works of art.

While this has made for many inspiring creative alternatives, it's time to dethrone that old ditty and create a new national repository of alternate Birthday song compositions. All submissions will be licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution license so that they may be freely incorporated into new works of art as long as the artist and the Free Music Archive are properly attributed. 

BASIC GUIDELINES

1. Songs shall be original "Birthday Song" compositions comprised of music that you create yourself, material that's in the public domain, or other material that you have express permission to use.
2. Entries must be in the form of an audio recording and in MP3 format, stereo bitrate 192kbps or higher (256kbps preferred).
3. Entries must be submitted using our form here.

Please see our Official Rules. 

PRIZE

The top three winners according to our incredible panel of judges will be included on a special CD promoting the winning Birthday song alternatives. This CD will be professionally designed, packaged and mailed by the Free Music Archive to parties who might want to use these songs, including movie studios, theater troupes, restaurant chains, sports leagues, scouting associations, youth groups, minor league baseball teams, major league Jai Alai squads, and bowling alleys. We’ll also send the tracks to music journalists, bloggers and radio stations to help get the word out and cement the new songs into the cultural subconscious.

The CDs will be accompanied by a letter explaining that "Happy Birthday To You" is under strict copyright protection, and encouraging the recipient to use the CD under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution. Together, this is our best shot at dethroning "Happy Birthday To You" at long last.

JUDGES

Our top notch panel of judges includes Maralie Armstrong (AS220), Jonathan Coulton (musician/internet superstar), Ira Kaplan (Yo La Tengo), Lawrence Lessig (Harvard Law School) and Greg Saunier (Deerhoof). They will be judging together based on originality, creativity, artistic merit, adherence to the "Birthday Song" theme, and general musical appeal.

TIMELINE

Dec 12: Contest Launch! Entries are now accepted here.
Jan 13: Submissions Deadline at 11:59pm ET
Jan 29: The judge's will announce their first, second and third prize winners.

BONUS FEATURE

On the Creative Commons Birthday Site, the Free Music Archive's Jason Sigal tells the story of how Chris Zabriskie started licensing his music under CC-BY and, in the process, opened new professional doors in his music career.

MORE ABOUT CC-10

In December 2002, Creative Commons released its first set of copyright licenses for free to the public. In the years following the initial release, Creative Commons and its licenses have grown at an exponential rate around the world. The licenses have been further improved and ported to over 50 jurisdictions. With some major platforms adopting the Creative Commons licenses and version 4.0 of the licenses around the corner, this anniversary is the perfect opportunity to celebrate the amazing material that is released under Creative Commons Licenses.

 

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This contest is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.