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<p>This paper aims to shed light on the question of whether musical appropriation is ethically unobjectionable. James Young (2021) has recently advanced a position on this topic, according to which, whereas the appropriation of a whole work is uncontroversially non-permissible, the appropriation of parts of a work is usually permissible. He grounds this view in ontological matters and in a criterion of fair use in terms of economic harm to the source work’s composer. I argue that, pace Young, we cannot make general ethical claims about musical appropriation because their truth is sensitive to the musical genres that the involved works belong to. First, I clarify the scope of musical appropriation by means of considerations on musical practices and ontology. This will reveal that versions and covers are not genuine cases of musical appropriation. In a second step, I consider a specific kind of musical appropriation: using the first measures of a source work as the first measures of a secondary work. I show that, even if we assume Young’s ontological framework and his criterion on fair use, the instances of this kind of musical appropriation count as fair or unfair depending on the musical genres of the involved works due to their normative implications for the composition and appreciation of those works.</p>
</abstract>

This paper aims to shed light on the question of whether musical appropriation is ethically unobjectionable. James Young (2021) has recently advanced a position on this topic, according to which, whereas the appropriation of a whole work is uncontroversially non-permissible, the appropriation of parts of a work is usually permissible. He grounds this view in ontological matters and in a criterion of fair use in terms of economic harm to the source work’s composer. I argue that, pace Young, we cannot make general ethical claims about musical appropriation because their truth is sensitive to the musical genres that the involved works belong to. First, I clarify the scope of musical appropriation by means of considerations on musical practices and ontology. This will reveal that versions and covers are not genuine cases of musical appropriation. In a second step, I consider a specific kind of musical appropriation: using the first measures of a source work as the first measures of a secondary work. I show that, even if we assume Young’s ontological framework and his criterion on fair use, the instances of this kind of musical appropriation count as fair or unfair depending on the musical genres of the involved works due to their normative implications for the composition and appreciation of those works.

Ethical Issues on Musical Appropriation

Disputatio

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

{"article-title":"Ethical Issues on Musical Appropriation"}

This paper aims to shed light on the question of whether musical appropriation is ethically unobjectionable. James Young (2021) has recently advanced a...

Ethical Issues on Musical Appropriation

Pubblicato online: 28 nov 2022

Pagine: 329 - 354

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2021-0017

Parole chiave
aesthetics, copyright, fair use, musical appropriation, ontology

© 2021 Nemesio García-Carril Puy, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Ethical Issues on Musical Appropriation

Pubblicato online: 28 nov 2022

Pagine: 329 - 354

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/disp-2021-0017

Parole chiaveaesthetics, copyright, fair use, musical appropriation, ontology

© 2021 Nemesio García-Carril Puy, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.

Parole chiave
aesthetics, copyright, fair use, musical appropriation, ontology