The ONE LICENSE team is excited to announce our upcoming series: Utilizing Public Domain for Your Ministry. Throughout this series, we will examine public domain melodies as entities all their own, separate from any texts they have been combined with over the years. We want to help musicians think creatively about how to pair old melodies with new (or new to your congregation) texts and to point out some musical considerations that you may want to focus on when choosing songs for your congregation. We hope this series will inspire your ministry and invigorate your worship experience!

First, a brief explanation of the differences between copyrighted works and public domain works. Copyright is a form of intellectual property law designed to protect works of authorship under any type of artistic medium. In the case of sacred music, this would include texts, melodies, accompaniments, and other musical or text arrangements. No matter what form the work takes, it must be a fixed, tangible medium — you cannot copyright an idea.

Stanford University Libraries offers an extremely helpful explanation of public domain: “The term ‘public domain’ refers to creative materials that are not protected by intellectual property laws such as copyright, trademark, or patent laws. The public owns these works, not an individual author or artist. Anyone can use a public domain work without obtaining permission, but no one can ever own it.” (You can find more helpful information here: https://fairuse.stanford.edu/overview/public-domain/welcome/)

No matter the original source of a melody, once it passes into the public domain, it becomes shared public property. Any person can use a public domain work in any way without securing permission. This makes public domain works extremely versatile and easily accessible for use in our congregations. Organizations can use self-made recordings of public domain works as background music for videos, webinars, conferences, play them as preludes/postludes, or improvise freely, allowing you to use your imagination to mix and match for your congregation’s unique style and needs. 

This freedom led to the common practice among Christian denominations of mixing and matching tunes and texts. Regular worshippers have probably noticed that the same melody can be sung with several different sets of words and that the same set of words can be sung with several different melodies. Many hymnal publishers include meter markings to help musicians know which texts and melodies are able to fit together based on the number of syllables. For example, when you see “8.7.7.8.” next to a song title, this means that the text and melody contain a grouping of 8 syllables, then 7, another 7, and finally 8 more. Any text labeled 8.7.7.8. will fit any 8.7.7.8. melody.

Wondering where you can locate a list of public domain texts and melodies? Here are a few resources our team utilizes:

Throughout this series, we will share some of the ONE LICENSE Team’s favorite public domain texts and tunes and highlight the elements that make these pieces so useful to any congregation desiring to expand their music repertoire. 

Have a favorite public domain tune you would like to learn more about? Contact our team at info@onelicense.net today. We look forward to sharing this Series with you! 

Photo by Susanne Jutzeler, suju-foto : https://www.pexels.com/photo/brown-wooden-bench-under-tree-3216369/