Copyright Information | The Salvation Army

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Copyright Information

Copyright is an important issue.

As The Sal­va­tion Army is part of the Chris­t­ian church, we need to ensure that we are uphold­ing our integrity when it comes to copy­right. Our job at the Cre­ative Min­istries Depart­ment is to encour­age and ensure that this is hap­pen­ing.

Copy­right pro­tects the owner’s rights over their intel­lec­tual prop­erty. Using this mate­r­ial with­out per­mis­sion is ille­gal, and can result in fines (up to $150,000) or impris­on­ment (up to 5 years). Licens­ing pro­vides the cre­ator of the con­tent with income, and allows us to use the mate­r­ial legally. This page contains an overview of the licenses avail­able through the Cre­ative Min­istries Depart­ment and what they mean.

Note: Larger than nor­mal events, such as Easter Camps and Con­fer­ences may require separ­ate licens­ing not listed here. Please con­tact CMD if you are unsure about your license needs.

Worship Music & Lyrics:

To dupli­cate music and lyrics for wor­ship ser­vices requires licens­ing. The fol­low­ing two licenses cover you for a vast major­ity of Chris­t­ian wor­ship music.

Note: Both of these licenses are com­pul­sory for Corps and Cen­tres that oper­ate a wor­ship ser­vice util­is­ing copy­righted musi­cal and lyri­cal content.
 

1. CCL - Church Copyright License:

  • This license allows you to repro­duce the words of songs for use in con­gre­ga­tional singing at your Corps. This includes using over­head pro­jec­tions and lyrics within your pre­sen­ta­tion soft­ware (like Pro Presenter)

2. MRL - Music Reproduction License:

  • This license allows you to copy phys­i­cal mate­ri­als includ­ing chord charts and mate­r­ial from pub­lished musi­cal works for the pur­pose of rehearsal at your Corps.
     

With these licenses...
 

You can:

  • - Print songs, hymns and lyrics in bul­letins, pro­grammes and song sheets
  • - Cre­ate over­head trans­paren­cies, slides or use any other for­mat that allows song lyrics to be visu­ally projected
  • - Arrange, print and copy your own arrange­ments. This includes vocal and instru­men­tal arrange­ments of songs used in con­gre­ga­tional 
  • wor­ship (where no pub­lished ver­sion is available)
  • - Pho­to­copy and dupli­cate pub­lished musi­cal works and other musi­cal mate­r­ial for your singers and musicians.

You can't:

  • - Rent or sell copies made under the license for any form of direct or indi­rect remuner­a­tion (pay­ment). This extends to pay­ment by gift, dona­tion or free-will offering
  • - Play or show in full (or in part) any copy­righted films, DVDs or any other copy­righted video material
  • - Dis­trib­ute copies to groups out­side of your Corps
  • - Trans­late songs into another language.
     

Movies & Films:

Com­mer­cial movies (of all for­mats includ­ing DVD and Blu-Ray) are only licensed for pri­vate view­ing in a pri­vate premi­ses. To show any copy­righted video mate­r­ial in a Corps or Cen­tre, the appro­pri­ate license is required. 

The fol­low­ing licenses pro­vide cover for a vast major­ity of copy­righted film material:
 

1. CVL - Church Video License:

  • This license allows you to show part of, or all of a film from a list of par­tic­i­pat­ing pro­duc­ers. Major pro­duc­ers include Dream­works and Uni­ver­sal.

License web­site:
 

2. The Big Studio Movie License

  • This license allows you to show part of, or all of a film from these par­tic­i­pat­ing movie stu­dios: Dis­ney, Road­show Films, Warner Bros., Sony, Icon, Hoyts Dis­tri­b­u­tion and Hop­scotch.

License web­site:
 

With these licenses...
 

You can:

  • Show parts of movies as ser­mon illustrations
  • Show full movies at events
  • Use movies for edu­ca­tional purposes.

You can't:

  • Use movies copied from another source or recorded from tele­vi­sion or any other medium
  • Charge any sort of admis­sion fee (whether by dona­tion or free will offer­ing) for video showings.
  • Adver­tise the film you are show­ing out­side your facil­ity (e.g. post the movie title on Facebook)
     

Family Stores & Retail:

Broad­cast­ing (pre-​recorded) music over a sound sys­tem or pub­lic address sys­tem, whether via the radio, CD, cas­sette tape or iPod in a retail envi­ron­ment requires the appro­pri­ate license (unless express per­mis­sion is given by the copy­right owner).
 

1. OneMusic - Retail:

  • This license allows you to broad­cast music in a retail out­let or environment.
     

With this license...
 

You can play music:

  • As back­ground music for cus­tomers and staff.
  • From iPods, CD Play­ers, radio or any other device
  • On-​hold on your tele­phone system

You can't:

  • Copy music or burn your on CD’s