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This appears to be a newly engraved (in Finale) edition by Clint S. Mers with a 2000 copyright claim. Unless "Cloudkiller94" happens to be the editor, I suspect this is a potential problem.

Hi Funper. Try looking on Ebay. You can also go to Abebooks and use the "advanced search" page. Search under Author = Liszt and Publisher = Peters and you'll likely churn up something. I don't yet know what editions have been scanned by CDSM - probably Breitkopf. There are also the Russian...

OK, so the copyright notice appears only on the reverse title page, and does not appear on either the title page itself, or on the first page of music, right? If that is so, then we need to determine the copyright status of the 1973 edition in its country of origin. The complicated thing here is: Wh...

Hi, I see we crossed posts! Yes, originality standards aren't set in stone - apart from things like transposition and re-typesetting, where there's fairly extensive case law holding that such things are "mechanical" and require no original creative contribution. That's why the copyright of...

Feldmahler, see the above post for some backgroud detail, but in a word the answer is: No. The copyright office routinely rejects registrations for re-engravings, transpositions, new typesettings, etc. Although copyright is not dependent upon registration, one is required to register in order to fil...

However, the US does not. But this is not as dramatic a difference as one might imagine. This is because of the weirdities in the US copyright law pre-GATT/TRIPS, which does seem to have a similar idea (this part I'm not sure of). In any case, if a work is in the public domain in the country of ori...

Hi Feldmahler! I would consider the 1973 Eulenburg score to be potentially copyrighted in the USA - though the claim on preface and editorial notes is certainly insteresting and raises lots of questions. I was under the impression Choudens and UE scores were actually the same engraving since they ha...

Herr Gedan is talking about a concept called editio princeps , a rubric under which a work that was never previously published is entitled to a term of protection for the work itself , over and above the edition. In Germany's case, that term is 25 years. Until 2003, there was a related concept in fo...

EmeraldImp writes: Ok, but what qualifies as 'something original'? Tweaking the layout to allow for better page turns? Adding measure numbers? Creating parts from a score? Translating text? I can re-engrave with zero changes to the musical data, but not to the layout, spacing, etc. And how do you pr...

The Symphonie Espagnole itself is public domain worldwide. Kalmus has reprinted the parts of original edition (Schott as I recall) and offers it for sale along with the score. Dover has reprinted the full score also. Lucks also offers score and parts for sale or rent. Neither the Kalmus, Lucks or Do...

The Bizet was published for the very first time in 1935 by Universal Edition in Vienna. They evidently didn't renew it (very unusual for them), since both Kalmus and Dover have reprinted that score. The Eulenburg score would therefore have to date from 1935 or later. If the Eulenburg is a mere repri...

Hi Emeraldimp! It's sort of complicated because it has to do with case law, and the various decisions over the years pertaining to the standard of "originality" of contributions to a derivative work based upon a public domain original. A mere re-engraving of a PD original would most likely...

Here's the OCLC listing. Title: Aria mit 30 Veränderungen : die Goldbergschen Variationen / Uniform Title: Goldberg-Variationen; arr. Author(s): Bach, Johann Sebastian, 1685-1750.  Rheinberger, Josef,; 1839-1901.  Publication: Leipzig :; Fr. Kistner, Year: 1883 Description: 1 score (87 p.) ;; 32 cm....

Aldona, the only score in your entire list that has any chance of being protected in the USA at all is the Schubert D. 96. It could still be protected in the USA if Peters renewed the copyright in 1984. The notice on the Peters score may very well be a scarecrow (a phony copyright notice printed on ...

I think that Herr Gedan's copyright claim is a perfectly legitimate one. The Piano Quintet, a student work of Mahler's, was not published until many years after his death (in the 1960s or 70s). While the manuscript itself is public domain, the work is in a fairly rough state and absolutely requires ...