p2pnet.net News:- Many of New Orleans’ musicians have never seen a royalty check. Some are buried in a paupers’ cemetery pocked with trash and crumbling, homemade tombstones.

So says a story in the LA Times here centering on the June 22 death of Lloyd Washington, a former member of the Ink Spots. He was 83.

But, continues the report, “Washington’s widow, Hazel, wouldn’t hear of such a thing.”

Instead, her husband’s ashes ended up at the Ernie K-Doe Mother-in-Law Lounge, “His shrine, a tribute by friends and fans, is a makeshift response to a sad and familiar problem: How to bury with dignity the artists who have enriched the musical,” says the story

Ernest Kador, Jr, was born on February 22, 1936, and died on July 5, 2001. He was “The Emperor of the World, Ernie K-Doe, Mother-in-Law, the one, the only, the baddest motorscooter and the Greatest Boy-Child ever conceived at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, Louisian” says the K-Doe site here.

The LA Times doesn’t say whether or not Mrs Washington approached the Big Four record label cartel on the question of royalties, but it’s probably a foregone conclusion that they wouldn’t exactly fall over themselves to be helpful.

Joyce Moore, Sam Moore’s wife and manager, said recently of a suggested $63.67 a month pension for her husband:

“It should have been $8,000. It’s wrong, and it all ties back to royalties. From 1965 to 1992, Atlantic contributed not one penny to Sam’s pension. The whole problem is accounting and accountability.

“We know the labels don’t know how to count except when it comes to their own money.”

In May, New York state Attorney General Eliot Spitzer ordered the then Big Five record labels to return $50 million to musicians they’d had under contract and to, “ensure that the artists and their descendants will receive the compensation to which they are entitled” .

Recording artists in California will soon be able to conduct annual audits on any record company doing business in the state. SB 1304 in effect gives artists a way to compel the labels to allow searches for unpaid royalties.

“While this bill does not sufficiently overhaul a broken system, it is a crucial first step in codifying threshold rights for all royalty artists,” AFTRA ( American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) president John Connolly said of SB 1304, going on that many artists are, “kept in debt to their labels and unable to challenge historical practices without committing economic and artistic suicide”.

Will the now Big Four soon start acting responsibly towards people such as Joyce Moore and Hazel Washington?

Don’t watch this space.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 8th, 2004 at 5:31 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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