By Julia Duggan
Staff Writer
Adding to the list of controversies and confusing events of this year’s Winter Olympics, one U.S. figure skating team — Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier, the skating duo that earned a silver medal in the team figure skating event — is being sued by Robert and Aron Mardo along with NBC for the same offense.
The Mardo brothers are known in the music industry as Heavy Young Heathens, the famous composing duo. Their list of compositions include Lucifer the television series, Deadpool the movie, several Spiderman movies, Ant Man the movie and The Simpsons soundtrack.
Heavy Young Heathens is suing over music copyright infringement. The issue involves one of the songs the skating duo used in their short program “House of the Rising Sun.”
“House of the Rising Sun” is a folk song — the true origins of the song are unknown, but at the same time, a large group of people are familiar with the song. One of the earliest recordings of the song was in 1933 by folk singer Clarence Ashley. Shortly after, a young girl named Georgia Turner could be heard singing the song on a popular Library of Congress album released in 1941. Leadbelly recorded a version also in the 1940s, Pete Seegar did one in 1958, and Joan Baez and Bob Dylan released a version of the song as well. The Animals famously covered the track in 1964.
Every single one of these artists, including Heavy Young Heathens, have a legal ability to copyright their version of “House of the Rising Sun” because of how the U.S. Copyright Laws are designed. Under the laws, there are two distinct categories: musical compositions and sound recordings. Musical compositions are for brand new songs that have been written while sound recordings are an artist’s interpretation of a song that has already been written.
This allows for multiple artists to be legally allowed to record and sell the same song with different interpretations as to how the song is performed. The tricky part with music copyright is that if an individual wants to use a sound recording, they need permission from the copyright holders. Not receiving permission from the copyright holders to use a sound recording is justifiable grounds for an individual to be sued over copyright infringement.
Heavy Young Heathens claims that the figure skating duo never contacted them to ask if they could use their song for their short program in the Olympics. Heavy Young Heathens feels justified in also suing NBC because they broadcasted the song without permission. Some news organizations are reporting that other broadcast networks are being considered as well for lawsuits since they helped to spread the song without the proper permission.
It could take several years to decide whether the claims Heavy Young Heathens state in their lawsuit are justified. The lawsuit appears to be asking for damages.
For the time being, the figure skating duo plans to leave the legal stuff to their legal team and focus on getting ready for their next competition.
