Plagiarism or theft
I’ve been watching a new detective drama series on YT.
The plot is about this young struggling writer who had acquired a few unpublished manuscript pages of a famous author and decided to write a novel using those few pages as the beginning.
That decision to steal another author’s work, led to a series of bad events which led to the investigation that formed the story for the series.
I have, of course, always known about this devious side of human nature.
The desire to steal someone else’s work and claim it as your own.
Years ago, while still a student, I had found a guitar study written by a well-known guitar teacher and personality.
It was a good study for left and right hand coordination as well as for practicing rest-strokes.
As it so happened, I went to London in the early 1980’s to study with the composer of the study, who, unfortunately, turned out to be a fraud.
One day, I mentioned the study to a fellow student and he told me that the study was actually written by a student of the teacher.
Apparently the student had given it to the teacher to look at, and somehow, mysteriously, it got published under the teacher’s name with no attribution to the student.
So not only a fraud but a thief as well.
At around that same time, while still in Wellington, I also discovered two new records by an exciting new artist.
I was stunned by the artistry of the playing on the recordings.
The two CDs were of works by Albeniz and Granados and the second CD works by Villa Lobos and some other composers.
A few years later, I happened to be in the Boston public library and guess what I found.
A book of transcriptions by the great Azpiazu of twelve Spanish dances by Granados.
I was excited by my find and started comparing the Granados works in the earlier CD and Azpiazu’s versions and they were almost identical, down to key choice.
Again no attribution.
Fast forward a few more years, I had a student from Tyler, East Texas, and he showed me a few scores that his former teacher had given him.
Among them was a score of the famous ‘Albinoni’ Adagio by Giazotto.
His teacher had arranged it for guitar, and it was beautifully done.
Then one day, I happened to buy a CD of transcriptions by a famous guitarist.
And guess what, there was a transcription of the Adagio on the CD, almost identical, and again no attribution.
Apparently, the guitarist knew my student’s teacher and had somehow acquired the transcription.
So it seems that the practice of stealing other people’s works and claiming it as your own is rampant in the classical guitar world.
Which is why, when I was working on my Bach CD, I refused to let anyone see my scores.
It’s not paranoia, just good and common sense.
In fact, before I recorded my CD, I had played my transcriptions to a few people, including a famous guitar player.
The latter expressed a great deal of interest in my transcriptions and repeatedly asked me for the score.
To which I said no—I always remember the story about how a student showed a guitar study he had composed to his teacher and somehow the study got published mysteriously after that.
After my CD was released, I decided it was time to share my transcriptions with others and they were published.
Little did I know that despite my earlier precautions, that every Tom, Dick, and Harry would take my transcription, change a few things here and there and claim it as their own.
Plagiarism—it’s theft by another name.