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9 May 2011

Copyright to expire in Irish national anthem

The Irish Times last week carried a front page report on the fact that copyright in Ireland's national anthem will expire at the end of 2012. Amhrán na bhFiann (The Soldier's Song) was written in 1907 and later adopted as Ireland's national anthem The last surviving author, Peadar Kearney, died in 1942 and so 2012 marks the 70th anniversary of the author's death and the end of the copyright term for musical and literary works. The fact of copyright expiry was raised in the Dáil (Irish parliament) last week where concern was expressed that the expiry of copyright might leave the anthem "open to abuse".

In reply David Brophy of FRKelly wrote a letter to the Irish Times pointing out that the debate failed to take into account that copyright in the anthem originally expired in 1992 (on the 50th anniversary of Peadar Kearney's death under the law as it then stood) but was later revived when an EU directive harmonised copyright term at life plus seventy years.

The letter also comments that concerns over potential abuse, while well meaning, are probably misplaced. Most other countries have anthems which have long been in the public domain, such as The Star Spangled Banner, God Save the Queen and La Marseillaise.  Each of these anthems has been the subject of controversial reinterpretation or reworking from time to time, yet this rarely if ever results in long term damage to the original version of a national anthem.