"Legal Title"[]
Similar to the discussion on America (song), but in reverse, I propose this be moved back to "Fugue for Tinhorns." Why? Well, I was initially suspicious since the playbills I've seen, and soundtrack albums of both movie and play call it "Fugue for Tinhorns." A little research shows that it was indeed copyrighted under that name, in 1950. In 1951, Loesser produced a variant of the same melody, recorded by Dina Shore and apparently with lyrics more suited to a female singer, and *that* was "Three Cornered Tune." Even Frankloesser.com admits it: "Copyrighted April 17, 1951. Music previously copyrighted as "Fugue for Tinhorns". Recorded by Dinah Shore (RCA Victor), Blossom Dearie (Painted Smiles), and Sarah Brightman (Polygram). Performed as a round." I found the lyrics to the Brightman recording, and they're completely different. I haven't seen the Bailey episode, but unless they did in fact use the alternative and not the race-oriented lyrics of the original, this should be moved. -- Andrew Leal (talk) 01:00, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
- I had put it under "Three Cornered Tune" because that's what it's entered under in ASCAP [1]; I had searched "Fugue for Tinhorns" incidentally because that is the name I'd always seen, and this is all I got. It is the alternate title not main title in their catalog. Notice that one of the alternate titles in the listing for "three-cornered hat" is "I got the horse right here". The listed artists are male and female. Since BMI has no entry, I went with it. In general we have gone with the ASCAP/BMI "legal" titles when they exist, such as with "Song for Kermit". The copyright for "Fugue for Tinhorns" must have either expired, been superceded by the subsequent "three-cornered hat" copyright, or never made it into the online databases.
- Incidentally, while I'll accept frankloesser.com as an authority on having an older copyright for the song, I've generally found that sheet music, playbills, liner-notes, etc. are not always a good way to hunt down the legal title of a song -- all sorts of stuff gets into those from what I've seen. It's why I generally go with ASCAP/BMI. -- Wendy (talk) 02:09, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
- Yeah, but if "Three Cornered Tune" is both a variant *and* created a year after the original, unless that *was* the version performed, I'd say move it. --- Andrew Leal (talk) 02:12, 7 September 2006 (UTC)