>[28.set.05] Copyright - UK judge hears testimony in Cuba for copyright case about Buena Vista Social Club music

Source: Associated Press WorldStream via NewsEdge Corporation
A British judge on Monday began hearing testimony in Cuba from elderly musicians and relatives of deceased composers for a U.S.-Cuban copyright dispute over music from the Buena Vista Social Club album and film.

Judge John Lindsay had previously been hearing the case involving rival claims from U.S. and Cuban publishing companies over rights to the traditional "son" recordings at London's High Court. He decided to travel to Cuba after video links to witnesses on the island broke down, and lawyers for the Cuban side argued it would be too expensive and difficult to bring frail, elderly musicians to London. Lindsay has no jurisdiction as a judge in Cuba but received permission to come as a "special examiner" to hear testimony, scheduled to last through Wednesday.

The hearing concerns a test case of 14 songs. Their five composers are all dead, but lawyers for the Cuban side say their heirs could benefit from royalty payments. Relatives as well as musicians, including composer Evelio Landa, went to the stand Monday in an impromptu tribunal set up in an old mansion that is now a museum in the Havana neighborhood of Vedado. "This is a claim of the heirs, we are the relatives of the (music's) creators," Ester Corona - the niece of composer Manuel Corona, who died in 1950 - said before the judge.

Interest in Cuban music surged around the world following the release of the "Buena Vista Social Club" album in 1997 and the 1999 film of the same name.
U.S.-based Peer International claims that its copyright to the songs, dating back to the 1930s, has been unlawfully taken over by the Cuban government, which came to power in a 1959 revolution. It is suing a Cuban firm, Termidor Music Publishers, which sought to register itself in Britain as the owner of the songs' copyrights.

Publisher Editora Musical de Cuba - which licensed rights to the music to Termidor - argues the original contracts are void because they were "unconscionable bargains" not recognized in law. Peter Prescott, a British lawyer acting for the Cubans, said in papers filed at court that many of the composers received only "a few pesos and maybe a drink of rum" for their work.
Peer International said royalties were paid until the revolution, when the U.S. trade embargo stopped all payments to Cuba. A translator and various advisers helped at Monday's hearing. Neither Lindsay nor lawyers spoke with the press.

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