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Sony Denied Implied License for Miller Songs

By Stan Soocher
March 29, 2010

The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee confirmed its earlier ruling that Roger Miller Music and Miller's widow Mary own the renewal-term copyrights to the performer/songwriter's 1964 and post-1964 compositions, which include some of his biggest hits. Roger Miller Music Inc. v. Sony/ATV Publishing LLC, 3:04-1132. But the district court changed its previous view that Sony at least had an implied non-exclusive license to use the renewal-term copyrights.

The Tennessee federal district court in 2005 and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in 2007 both agreed that Sony owned the renewal terms to Roger Miller's 1958-1963 songs. (The Sixth Circuit had also decided that Miller's renewal copyrights were to be divided 50% to the surviving spouse and the other 50% among the author's children. Broadcast Music Inc. v. Roger Miller Music Inc., 396 F.3d 762 (6th Cir. 2005).) But Miller died in 1992, at the end of the initial 28-year copyright term that applied to the 1964 and later songs, and thus didn't live to when the renewal term took effect on Jan. 1, 1993. On remand, the district court decided that under the federal Copyright Act, '304(a)(1)(C), the renewal terms for the post-1963 songs thus vested in Miller's heirs, rather than Sony.

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