Thursday, September 13, 2007

thoughts about music from a shrub


Does anyone have any idea why people applauded when he made that stupid response to what was a perfectly good question that should have been easy to answer? Is the audience as musically clueless or musically phobic as the president? I don't get it.

4 comments:

David said...

Yeah! Why doesn't the president know everything about everything? Why did the Supreme court elect him if he doesn't know how to answer a simple question about performance righ... or whatever the question was about? What an idiot. I bet Jacques Chirac (or whoever the other guy was) could have answered that one.

Charles CĂ©leste Hutchins said...

The questioner probably should have spent some more time explaining the terms he was using, since not many folks outside of music are aware of the different categories of performance rights. Bush's honest, folksy ignorance shows what a regular guy he is, as opposed to a snobby intellectual.

Which is what David is getting at there in his asinine comment. Yeah, uh, David, you clearly understood what the question was about, which, alas, makes you smarter than the president. Which is alarming since you don't come across as all that bright.

Anyway, the real answer to your question is that the only people that get into these kinds of events love Bush so much that they would applaud if he shit on the stage.

Anonymous said...

What bothers me more than the fact he didn't understand is the absolute glee he seemed to take in NOT understanding. He could have asked for clarification and pretended to give a crap. But instead, he made a big joke of it all. I've never seen a president so amused by his own ignorance.

Elaine Fine said...

Eric Hochberg left a comment that clarified the question that was asked on Jason Heath's Double Bass blog, which I am leaving here as well:

Organizations such as BMI and ASCAP charge "statutory licensing fees" to presenters of recorded music, such as radio stations, internet sites, movies, TV, etc. They are usually calculated on a per play basis. These fees are distributed to publishers, composers and lyricists as royalties for their work.

In the US there is no system in place to pay performance royalties to musicians on recorded works. In the UK, for instance, PPL charges presenters of recorded music for musician's performances and distributes royalties to them. PPL does not work on behalf of musicians recording in the US.

Music First Coalition (musicfirstcoalition.org) is working to get US musicians performance royalties.

The AFM has the Sound Recording Special Payments Fund that pays union musicians a depreciating payment for five years based on the union contracted record sessions they do. Record labels that are union signatories contribute to this fund.