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If someone took a folk melody and wrote a symphony based on it, would it be plagiarism?
I am asking because yesterday I listened to a Mahler symphony and it really seems like he more or less copied from Fra Martino.
Now, who cares what Mahler did a century ago, but if someone did it today, would they have problems?
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I doubt that Mahler's case is plagiarism and besides he didn't copy
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In reality, Mahler changed his way and started from that simple melody to arrive at writing a terrible funeral march.
I don't think it is plagiarism, at most classifiable (even today) as a reworking. Even SIAE has an ad hoc form for this kind of operation ... so ... ?...!
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Ok, but couldn't he have made up his own melody ... I mean, it's not like he just took something like, damn: "Frère Jacques"!!!
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Zanzibar wrote:If someone took a folk melody and wrote a symphony based on it, would it be plagiarism?
I am asking because yesterday I listened to a Mahler symphony and it really seems like he more or less copied from Frère Jacques.
Now, who cares what Mahler did a century ago, but if someone did it today, would they have problems?
Think about how Bach wrote almost 400 chorales using Gregorian melodies, how Bartók stuffed folklore motifs throughout all his music... think of Ives (the symphonies), uh-huh... Copland (Appalachian Spring...), my goodness... they are all copies. What are you saying? Plagiarism is when someone pretends a piece is theirs, not when they rework a motif from the folk tradition. If that were the case, 90% of composers would be accused of plagiarism.
PS as for Mahler, you have taken a very famous example that has very precise dramatic motivations: if I were you, I would take a look at some texts on Mahler's music to understand the reason why he used folk motifs (not just Frère Jacques).
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Zanzibar wrote:Ok, but couldn't he have invented his own melody ... I mean, it's not like he just took who knows what, damn: "Frère Jacques"!!!
Mahler's music presents a coexistence between refined and elegant taste with banal elements such as fanfare themes, carousel themes, or folk-like motifs that are integrated into very complex formal structures. Precisely, the theme of the third movement of the first symphony "The Titan" (1884-88) is the minor key version of the canon "Frère Jacques" which is transformed into a funeral march of a grotesque character.
... perhaps it is time to delve deeper into the subject
