Musicians were given to understand that music archives in India, are non-profit organisations working expressly to promote documentation and research. Not for a moment was there ever any mention of a commercial transaction between the archive and a record label or any other organisation for disseminating this material. Dissemination was to be carried out only on the premises of the archive, by way of arranging listening sessions for one or more persons. Each archive had a set of rules for depositing material and for accessing it thereafter. However, in the past year or so, one has come across several attempts being made by archives to sell or license their recordings to record labels for commercial release. While I am all for a commercial release, it can be done only after procuring requisite permissions from the performers. Unfortunately, this has not always been the case, as is evident from the recent steps taken by the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA), Mumbai.

The letter attached below, addressed to the NCPA and its consultant from the UK, is self-explanatory.

From: Shubha Mudgal [mailto:shubha.....com]
Sent: Wednesday, May 28, 2008 12:17 AM
To: Suvarnalata Rao
Cc: anepradh1……com; vmehta…..com; omortimer…….com [emails obfuscated]
Subject: Archives

Dear Vijayabai, Owen, and Suvarna,

Thanks very much for informing us of your efforts at commercially releasing archival material in the possession of the NCPA. We also read about this in the Times of India. After going through the PDF that you had sent earlier and the catalogue that you were kind enough to also send, we have the following response:

1. We are happy to hear that NCPA wishes to make its archival collection widely accessible. However, we are extremely distressed at the manner in which you have chosen to accomplish this task. We and other artistes had always believed that the NCPA was a premier institution that housed a selection of the country’s most valuable archival recordings. Artistes had permitted some of these recordings only on the basis of their being housed for archival purposes. The fact that you have now chosen to commercially release these without first consulting artistes, is tantamount to going against the wishes of the artistes.

2. Your letter did mention the fact that the legal status with regard to these recordings was such that they were licensed to the NCPA expressly for archival purposes and that the copyrights rested with the artistes. However, we wish to point out that the NCPA at most times did not take permissions from the artistes even to record for archival purposes. We have both performed at various venues at the NCPA on innumerable occasions, and but for the recent change in policy which requires the artistes to sign a document permitting recordings, such permissions had not been taken earlier. Indeed, even if these permissions had been acquired from the main performers, the accompanists were never asked for similar permissions. This was neither done in writing nor verbally.

3. On occasions when artistes were aware that their performances were being recorded, they sometimes requested NCPA to give them copies of these for study purposes. However, their recordings never reached them, ostensibly because they needed to be in the safe custody of the NCPA archives and that making them available to the artistes could lead to their misuse! Artistes were told that they would be in a position to negotiate deals with record labels for their personal gain. However, the NCPA now chooses to do the very same thing, without taking the artistes into confidence. May we ask how an institution that has taken upon itself the task of safeguarding the property of artistes, can now attempt at selling these, without the express permission of the artistes to even begin such an endeavour? Strangely enough we were copied on an email that invited tenders, but nobody from NCPA thought fit to consult us in our capacity as artistes featured on the catalogue for sale.

4. We are sure that some artistes and their heirs would agree to such a sale of their recordings and would therefore not like to jeopardize their interests by protesting against this move. But it seems strange that the NCPA chooses to seek potential buyers only when it finds itself reeling under financial constraints. Significantly, it did not part with the recordings when the artistes faced financial burden that would surely have been infinitely greater than NCPA ‘s need for funds.

5. The appointment of consultants for this endeavour, uploading the catalogue and preparing a sampler CD has evidently taken up much of your time. But nobody thought fit to invite consultants/representatives from the artistic community. If it is accessibility that the NCPA hopes to achieve why did it not think of uploading the catalogue on the NCPA site? In fact, this should have been done several years ago.

6. Needless to say, we would not like you to include any of our recordings in the catalogue that you choose to sell to potential buyers.

7. We would like you to send us copies of all recordings in the possession of your archives that feature us as main performers or accompanying musicians.

8. The trend to make archival recordings commercially available was started in a major way by the Sangeet Natak Akademi and the NCPA has followed suit without so much as thinking of the far reaching adverse consequences. We fear that other archives will look upon this as a precedent and even make concerted efforts at selling bootlegged recordings that have now become their prized possessions. All this will be done without consulting artistes prior to inviting tenders. Naturally, this does not relate to or impact you in any way, as in all likelihood you will say that these are policies that institutions choose and execute on their own steam. However, this will be treated as a huge letdown by several artistes including us who reposed their faith in institutions such as yours. We would like you to know that we were on the verge of facilitating the deposit of an invaluable collection of archival music with the NCPA archives. But, the recent move initiated by NCPA has prompted us to advise the source not to think of depositing anything any longer with NCPA.

9. We wonder how this will impact the lives of folk artistes, but then again, you may well reply that they have given you their total consent to archive and publish their recordings on any format in perpetuity!

In utter dismay,

Shubha Mudgal and Aneesh Pradhan