A Professional Victim: On Ira B. Arnstein

Is Plagiarism Inevitable In Pop Music?
Over one million pirated CDs and DVDs are destroyed by a bulldozer during an event organised by Algeria's national office of copyright and related rights in Algiers on October 15, 2012 as part of an anti-piracy campaign by authorities. AFP PHOTO/FAROUK BATICHE (Photo credit should read FAROUK BATICHE/AFP/Getty Images)
Over one million pirated CDs and DVDs are destroyed by a bulldozer during an event organised by Algeria's national office of copyright and related rights in Algiers on October 15, 2012 as part of an anti-piracy campaign by authorities. AFP PHOTO/FAROUK BATICHE (Photo credit should read FAROUK BATICHE/AFP/Getty Images)

Suppose you want to write a brand-new popular tune. A piano has only eighty-eight keys, and the span of the human voice is even narrower. Only a few rhythms and chord progressions reliably please the palate of the masses, and myriad tunes have already been written under these constraints and are protected by copyright. Is it possible to write a new one that doesn’t echo an old one?

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