One time at Band camp...
I woke up and saw that we weren't in Kansas anymore. We are now in the land of greed and money monger celebrities. It shouldn't have shocked me, but now it's infringing on my livelihood and art form!

The lines have been drawn and once again, the greed of the wealthy seems to have waged war on the average person. Since the beginning of America’s love of pop culture there has been a war brewing: Performing artists (some of the world’s wealthiest citizens) have decided to enact The Performance Rights Act, rallied by Bono and other major bank celebs. It has me wondering, what the hell? If we activate this Red Herring of radio stations paying royalties for every song they play, the line in the sand will become very blurred and then, where does it stop?

As it stands, Celebs want royalties every time one of their songs is played on the radio. Radio stations are creatures of habit; they play the same songs (usually the top ten) in the same order for the same duration of time. How do songs get on the top ten? Radio stations play them. Ratings go up or down (according to the taste of us, the average Joe) and then the songs become part of the elite top ten. Listeners run out and buy the CD because they have liked the sound of the artist or group. See? It was the great circle of Americana life.

As a playwright, I’ve used snippets of popular songs during seating, blackouts, scene changes, line deliveries, intermissions, etc. The audience relates to the songs and it moves the play and atmosphere along. I’ve paid for the music and I have made my own CD mixes for each play and if I don’t, every song I’ve suggested in the script is backed by the theaters owning the music, meaning they own a CD or song closely resembling the one I suggested. In addition, the theaters that have been host for my plays have a “blanket insurance” policy. Moreover, they have a clause which states that their patron fee for the showing of my play only covers the bare minimum of the performance (believe me, my royalties average out to be cents, which is why I have a day job). In addition the theaters give credit to the artist by listing the songs and artist in my play programs. Now I’m wondering, do I have to pay an added fee for the chorus of Boy Georges, Do you really want to hurt me? After one of my characters offs her husband with a frying pan? I’m thinking, yes. Even though it’s the theaters track? Definitely yes.
Damn!
One more thing, on top of the billion other things I have to do just to get something from my twisted brain staged (blog to follow, I promise).

So where does the line in the sand end? While the greedy singing sensation horizon inches its way toward cover bands, Karaoke lounges and Community Theater, Do we sink into the sand or jump for solid ground? It’s bad enough that we have to sing really lame renditions of Happy Birthday in public (including classrooms and soccer fields) because a certain celebrity owns the copyrights to that staple of American culture.

What’s next? Will celebrities make the public put a quarter in their dashboard when the DJ announces, “Next up, PINK with ‘I wanna start a fight,’ please insert .75 or you can listen to three and a half minutes of Enzyte commercials.”