TME Tuesday: Remembering to Source Your TMEs

It is Tuesday again, and I am searching through my TME file to see what I can share with you all. I'm kinda stuck in a rut and haven't finished any TMEs lately (though I have quite a few that are in the development stage of things), so there are some slim pickings around.

It's not like I don't have TMEs that I could share, but I am very particular about sharing the work of others. I had a TME and original song stolen from me, so I am hyper-vigilant about protecting the work of others. I try to give credit where I know it, and I search for credit before identifying something as my own. That's why all the TMEs that I share on Tuesdays are either original songs or are adaptations or therapeutic uses for songs published by others. I do not share the TMEs of other music therapists because I feel a need to protect their intellectual property and give credit where it is due - unlike the intern who came after me and took very public credit for a song I wrote during my internship that she learned from my internship director who learned it from ME! (Can you tell that this situation STILL makes me angry, 25 years later???)

Now, I certainly don't hesitate to use TME ideas from other therapists in the music therapy session itself. I have some wonderful songs and TMEs that other therapists have composed or developed, and I certainly don't mind if you use the TMEs that I share and sell during sessions. I do, however, make sure that I know who wrote what, and if I am not sure about who developed the TME, I let people know that fact.

I have some TMEs that I am not sure if I wrote them or if I heard them from others. Those are kept to myself as well, because I don't want to take credit from someone else inadvertently. It's too bad, though, because I have some great songs and TMEs from others sitting in my card file and my digital database.

Here's the bottom line, for me. If you are going to use the intellectual property of someone else in a professional capacity, then you must know who that person is BEFORE you present their property.

So, this is why my TME plans have a place for Source. This is where I affix my first copyright statement for original songs and TME development. It is where I place all information about composers, arrangers, performers, recordings, and other relevant stuff for songs that are not my own. I use APA formatting to complete the source, and I find that it makes it really easy to identify the original developers of either the music or the therapeutic function of the music.

Give credit where credit is due, okay?? Help a fellow musician get a bit of recognition and royalties for their work. Please, NEVER take credit for someone else's work if there is even the slightest doubt in your mind. You never know when the actual composer of the song is standing right behind you, listening to you steal that property right from under them.

Happy Tuesday!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Sing A Song Sunday - The Time Change Song (Fall)

Being An Internship Director: Why I Do Very Little Active Recruitment

Dear AMTA