Yes, Maurice Ravel is the sole author of his very famous Bolero. The Nanterre judicial court ruled on Friday evening, and the work is therefore kept in the public domain (it had been since 2016). Ravel’s heirs wanted the Bolero be considered a “collaborative work”, which would have extended the copyright until 2039. Or even 2051, if we take into account the date of the death of the ballet’s first choreographer, Bronislava Nijinska. If the rights generated represented “for a time millions and millions of euros” annual, according to Sacem’s lawyer, Me Josée-Anne Bénazéraf, the amounts reached an average of 135,507 euros per year between 2011 and 2016.
Ravel’s heirs VS Sacem
France Musique attended at the eventful trial, last February. The lawyers of the composer’s rights holders had focused their attacks on Sacem, accused of being “opaque, partial”Sacem which would inspire a “awe” and would claim the “made of prince”, would decide who is the author of a work “when it suits”. “Only on the Bolero”even, had hammered the lawyer of the estate of Ravel, who also pointed to videos, press releases, where Sacem rejoiced at the fall of Bolero in the public domain. For rights holders, the Bolero was a collaborative work. Inseparable from the original ballet, created by Maurice Ravel, but also by the choreographer Bronislava Nijinska, and by the scenographer Alexandre Benois. According to them, Sacem had also put “a lot of energy to make Nijinska disappear”, going so far as to modify the Bolero Wikipedia page.
“Faux”we retorted from the other side of the bar. “Fiction has no place in the courtroom”. For the defense, “Ravel never ceased to claim himself as the sole author of Boléro”. He also wrote “my Bolero” on multiple occasions. And the common thread, from Ravel’s death to today, would be the “extreme greed” of the estate, who did not hesitate to resort to the“Tax optimization”Has “shell companies”, with “small arrangements between new friends”. For Sacem, Nijinska’s dance was “detachable” of work, as are the sets and costumes by Alexandre Benois. Ravel’s heiress, Evelyne Pen de Castel, was sentenced to a symbolic euro at Sacem, “in compensation for his damage resulting from the abuse of the author’s moral rights”details the decision.
