On Collaboration- Music

Remember how I said I would be writing about collaboration? Well here is some of it.

One of the key issues with collaboration is remixing. Where is the line drawn between what is one person's work and what is another person's? How much sampling is ok? Do the people who own the sampled work make a profit if you make a profit? And can you make up an entire song made of samples? This poses quite the problem for the legal aspects.

Nowadays you can find websites dedicated to making samples and tracks of music available to those who would like to collaborate on music projects -and keep it within the law. Kompoz is one such site that allows for this collaboration. Using the Creative Commons permissions, tracks are made available for usage within the stated permission.

Here is a person who is obviously a genius at remixing: Norwegian Recycling. Listen to "Recychedelic". It is a mashup of 16 different songs. Seriously, this guy is good. Lend an ear.

On a side note, while exploring kompoz.com I came across a track I really like (see below) and so it makes me want to do something with it. I probably will because I am exploring collaboration- so it will be research! :)

On a Sunday Afternoon in Palmas de Mallorca

I just had a thought (while in the library researching an essay). I remembered this woman from Mallorca, Spain. It was a Sunday afternoon and outside of a church there was opera music. In the middle of a crowd of people, there was a woman who looked a bit like a bag lady, singing her heart out with a little karaoke machine. She could have been performing on a stage at the NAC or the Spanish equivalent, but there she was in front of a church on a Sunday afternoon in the oldest section of Palmas de Mallorca surrounded by people- young and old- in awe of her talent. I wondered if she preferred this lifestyle to another one that she could have. I wondered what brought her to do what she does. I also wondered if the money that people gave her for her songs gave her the things she needed in life.