[Scott Dorsey]

Bill Graham wrote:

t was the problem for my friend Blake, whose dixieland band can no longer
play their Monday Night gig at the local Pizza house. BMI didn't want any
$5. they wanted $1000 a year from the pizza house's owner, and he couldn't
afford to pay that. So, Blakes group hit the road. How much of that $1000
would get into the hands of anyone who ever wrote a dixieland song? I'll
answer you that.....ZERO! Thats how much.

Maybe Blake should have talked to the BMI rep and explained the situation. All
of these things are negotiated and nobody pays the first fee they are offered.
Especially when most of the music (though not all) is PD. Another alternative
is for Blake to decide to play only PD music and arrangements (or his own
arrangements), which is a fairly easy thing to do for Dixieland.

BMI is there to make sure everybody plays fairly and everybody gets paid for
their work, they are not some evil organization out to "get" musicians.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."