Music business headlines have confirmed that superstar artist Prince has returned to Warner Brothers Records, a relationship which ended acrimoniously 18 years ago, with a deal that will see Prince regain ownership of his back catalog of recordings. This deal marks a new era as the ability to terminate master recording copyrights after 35 years was granted in the Copyright Revision Act of 1976 and became effective in 1978, the year that Prince’s debut album came out.
Just as the record business has been staggering back to its feet after the digital assault started by Napster over a decade ago, another hard blow to the record industry business model is starting to have ripple effects. Recording artists and songwriters whose music was recorded after 1978 are now entitled to start terminating their contractual transfers and demanding back their copyrights. The 1976 Copyright Act, in a provision that was generally overlooked until now, provides for the termination of copyright transfers.
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