Hi Bob - and Arthur - I think its a scam to avoid paying royalties.
In the unlikely event they get a usable song, they can pay the writer a
prize of say £5000 and pat them on the head, then use the song for all time
without any additional payments.

If they did the obvious thing and commissioned a song from Paul McCartney,
they would have to pay realistic amount for its constant use.
I'd like to see Yoko Ono sorting out the Beeb if they wanted Imagine as a
national song.

As its the Beeb who is singlehandedly responsible for intellectual property
payments getting out of hand, I've no sympathy for them.

bw
SallyE

on 15/2/03 11:15 pm, Bob Cooper at [log in to unmask] wrote:

> Hi Arthur,
> Now here's a story to read and enjoy! Thanks for the read!!!
> I guess after the BBC's fudge and fiasco trying to find out who was the
> greatest Briton (thank goodness it never ended up being Princess Diana - but
> how come she got so far?) I feel they're really losing the plot.
> I mean we ain't got no Sex Pistols no more to parody any national anthem
> into popularity!
> And a panel... (!) Wow... what panel selected lanky Willie's Daffodils or
> Rupert Brooke's Soldier, or Kipling's If?
> I suggest we suggest to the BBC that they get all the celebrities they're
> saturating the air-waves with, maroon them on a desert island, and don't let
> them off until National Poetry Day when they'll have written one together!
> We, the great poetry public, can nominate TV cooks, gardeners, chat-show
> hosts, fashion designers, retired sportspersons, whoever, to go to the
> island (and replacements when the odd one or two actually realise going
> insane is preferrable to the challenge they've been given!). The should also
> have to play games on the beach  to earn a rhyming dictionary, a spelling
> dictionary, a thesaurus, and the like. (The camerapersons will be given
> special counselling.)
> Bob
> I guess, as well, the result's got to be simple to play so Tony Blair and
> David Blunket can strum and drum it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>> From: arthur seeley <[log in to unmask]>
>> Reply-To: The Pennine Poetry Works <[log in to unmask]>
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Today's Guardian
>> Date: Thu, 13 Feb 2003 19:07:45 -0000
>> 
>> BBC invites public to pen new national anthem
>> 
>> Jason Deans
>> Thursday February 13, 2003
>> 
>> The BBC is launching a nationwide search for an alternative national anthem
>> that reflects modern Britain.
>> The aim is for the winning entry to be sung everywhere from schools and
>> churches to football terraces.
>> 
>> BBC bosses hope it will become as popular as Jerusalem, the hymn that many
>> people consider a more rousing anthem for the nation than God Save the
>> Queen.
>> 
>> The competition will be launched in tomorrow's BBC2 programme Essential
>> Poems (to Fall in Love With).
>> 
>> Presenter Daisy Goodwin said: "We are looking for a poem for our times -
>> one that might be set to music and sung at weddings, on football terraces
>> or in school assemblies.
>> 
>> "It must be no more than 16 lines long and have the intensity and resonance
>> of William Blake's short poem that was turned into the hymn Jerusalem.
>> 
>> "The winning entry will grab the collective consciousness in the way of
>> Rudyard Kipling's If, The Soldier by Rupert Brooke or Daffodils by William
>> Wordsworth."
>> 
>> A panel of judges, including eminent poets, will select their favourite
>> entries over the summer.
>> 
>> The shortlisted poems will be screened in a programme on National Poetry
>> Day on October 9 and a winner chosen.
>> 
>> Entrants must be over 18 and the competition closes on May 31.
>> 
> 
> 
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