Authorship in Music

I believe that writing original music confers the status of "author" to the songwriter. He has, after all penned the song down himself; note by note and word by word. The song, on the whole, belongs to him. It is something which he, through the process of creation, has appropriated for himself. I am reminded of the numerous copyright laws protecting the soverignity of various musical compositions of our time, society and culture. Has not music itself been conferred the benefits of property, to those who create and thus "own" it?

But what of a music writer's various influences? Popular songwriters and musicians are always asked about their musical influences--from whence does one draw the inspiration to write songs? Such influences take a myriad number of types and forms. I can imagine that, consciously or otherwise, the songwriter is always drawing from past experiences, others' works, different genres, while writing his "own" music. What impact does this have on our notion of the songwriter's authorship? Can the final work be truly accredited to him then, as being his own?

I would like to note, at this juncture, that it might also be worthwhile to question if my own words, on this page, truly belong to myself. Sure, I thought them up with my own mind, but am I not at the same time merely extrapolationg from the ideas that Foucault had previously put forth on authorship?

 

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