Can the demo songs included in BIAB be used as is without any royalty fee or violation of copyright? Are those taken directly from existing commercial songs? There are some that I love and I would like to put lyrics into it and use it almost as is.

Many of those songs are indeed the chord progressions of known songs. The chord progression can’t be copyrighted, but once you add melodies, they can. From past discussions here, I believe the demo songs are copyrighted by PG Music.

Hello Froi,

You are free to use anything you create in Band-in-a-Box as listed here in our FAQ:

http://www.pgmusic.com/salesfaq1.htm#22

"The arrangements made by Band-in-a-Box are yours, and your songs may be used freely as long as they don't infringe upon the intellectual property rights of others."

The exception to this are the Demos included with Band-in-a-Box as they are the property of PG Music.

I hope this helps!

If I do a little modification to the demos, would that still be an infringement? Thanks!!!

Hi Froi,

Anything you create yourself using our software is yours to use however you like, but we ask that you do not use our demos for your own projects.

Thanks
Kent
PG Music

Can you type the same chord progression in a new song?

Hi Kent & all - this is a tricky issue! If I import the included demo chord sequences/arrangements from various BB styles into separate Logic tracks, and then play & record my own guitar/piano/mandolin melody over the top on new additional tracks - can I sell that project/mix without copyright infringement??

Exactly which content (or combination of content) is it we can't use without infringement??? I quote from above "The exception to this are the Demos included with Band-in-a-Box as they are the property of PG Music" - another quote "The chord progression can’t be copyrighted" - this is quite confusing, what precisely does that mean???

Would be great to have complete clarification on this please! Cheers, Carl

It means that the chord progression can’t be copyrighted. As I explained above, some of the PG Music demo songs use the same chord progression as popular songs, but they add their own melodies so the resulting song is copyrighted.

Please note, I’m not a member of the PG Staff.

Thanks a lot Matt - appreciate the clarification!! Best regards, Carl

Thanks to all who replied and to those who gave additional questions that further helped in clarifying things.