The village of Heľpa, located in Banská Bystrica Region, must pay an invoice of more than €80 to copyright holders of songs that were sung during a Mother’s Day event since it had not specified the specific list of songs that would be performed, the Sme daily reported.
“The village has still not submitted the list of used songs which, according to the collective licence agreement, was to be sent within seven days after the day of the event,” said Katarína Tomandlová, the marketing director of SOZA, an association that has the legal right to collect royalties for authors, as quoted by Sme.
The daily reported that representatives of the village wrote only “Heľpa’s folk songs” on its list and Tomandlová did not say whether the association had asked for additional and more detailed specification of the repertoire.
“I responded in an email,” Tomandlová told Sme. “I will not comment on it anymore.”
Mária Kemková from the town administration in Heľpa told Sme that if SOZA asked them for completion of the list they would be willing to send it to SOZA.
SOZA has not explained how it calculated the royalty sum for the performance, Sme wrote, adding that the chair of the association, Vladimír Repčík, had called Kemková to talk about the sum but had not explained it according to Kemková. She added that to avoid the fees in the future the town would classify future performances as a “civic ceremony” which is, Sme wrote, not covered by royalty payments under Slovakia’s copyright law.
The Association of Towns and Villages of Slovakia (ZMOS) told Sme that it would like to prepare an amendment to the copyright law which would exempt any singing by children from royalty charges in the future. The Culture Ministry has not made any comments on this idea, Sme wrote.
Source: Sme
For more information about this story please see: Villages asked to pay copyright fee for singing folk songs at events
Compiled by Radka Minarechová from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
