Classic music

Hi,

does anyone know if I run into legal issues if I use classic music (Mozart, Beethoven, Bach) in a commercial game?

I got some really nice (royalty free) midi-tunes from those masters above and I'd like to create some background songs from this stuff.

The usual copyright should be void after some centuries I guess, but on the other side using music from anywhere these days is the half way to court ;)

Would be nice to find some definite answers...

Jake

Its a minefield I'd steer well clear of, personally.

While the original music might be out of copyright, the arrangement your midi is based on may not be. Its all complicated and horrible, and, rather you than me, tbh.

GFK is right, although the music (the notes on the paper) is now public domain any particular recording/performance is owned by the group that did the recording.

The smartest solution would be to ask a composer for a soundalike of that classical piece, then you have the same impression while still being legal.

So having a 1:1 note transcription would be fine?

Then I could recreate some tunes note by note or play them in (depending on the stuff), though this will be a lot of work. I hoped to get around this, I'm a little bit out of training with this classical stuff ;)

If the midi file's royalty free and the music itself is out of copyright, I doubt there'd be a problem.

Also, there are websites that list copyright status for well-known classical pieces.