How to rescue .wav files on the scratched music CD.

[satimis]

1. Buy a replacement disc.

Looks like all other options have already been posted. Whether you tried them all, is a different question.

It is not easy to get the replacement of Italian opera CDs here.

I'm trying hard to rescue following 2 Italian opera CDs which are covered with scratches:-
1. Il Corsaro by Verdi
2. L'Italiana in Algeri by Rossini

I purchased them in Italy on traveling in the past.

I still have another headache to convert VHS tapes of Classics, including Opera, to .mp4 video. I have no device to play them.

Regards

[satimis]

Another option (after making copies of the readable tracks) would be to try to resurface the disk. Obviously this can go horribly wrong, but if you've got the readable tracks of the disk copied first there's no reason not to try.

A bit of background: a CD is made up of multiple layers: A carrier of clear plastic on top of which there's the actual data layer (stamped into the carrier on mass fabricated discs; on burned CDs it's a layer of a some kind of lacquer that reacts to strong laser light by changing some of it's properties) on top of that there's a reflective layer and then the label. So in contrast to what everyone believes the label side is actually the side of a CD that's really susceptible to damage. There's only a few µm of material between your data and any harm on that side. Check the CD by holding it up against a light-source to see whether there's any damage of that kind. If there is, then you might as well not bother.

Damage to the clear underside of the disk on the other hand is not quite as problematic. While scratches (or dirt) on that side might make reading impossible, the data is still there and polishing off a thin layer of material using a soft cloth and some kind of abrasive (or - in the case of dirt - just simply cleaning) might make it readable again. You can find tutorials on the net and there are also professional services who will do it for a price that's a lot less than the price of a new CD.

Holger

Hi Holger,

Thanks for your advice.

I'm now duplicating/copying my music CDs to hard drive. I have >500 music CDs. Some of the music CDs were purchased abroad in my past traveling. >90% are classics, including Symphony, Concerto, Opera, etc.

In recent few days I have succeeded duplicating/copying 120 music CDs to the storage hard drive without problem. Only 4 music CDs are found covering with scratches. I have cleaned them with toothpaste and 75% alcohol with no result.

One damaged Opera CD can be mounted on DVD-Writer with all tracks .wav displayed on File Manager but I couldn't copy them to computer. It is very strange.

I'm still working.

Regards

Edit
====
Duplicating/copying music CDs to a hard drive of computer is quite easy with Copy&Past command. It is not time consuming.

I'm investing most of my time in copying/converting the content on their printed boxes to text files in computer. The technology is "image to text". I just take a photo on the box of music CD with a mobile photo, sending the images to computer and converting the image to text.

To re-arrange the text on the converted .txt file is quite time-consuming

[satimis]

Hi all,

Up-to-now I have duplicated/copied >200 music CDs to hard-drive without problem, only discovering 5 CDs with scratch problem. I have 2 WD magnetic hard-drives for this job, each retaining a copy of my 500 music CDs. So in case one hard drive having problem, I still have another drive.

I have another thought of uploading my stock of CDs to YouTube or similar website for private use, only friends with password able to listen them online.

I'll create slideshow for each CD. The video will be scenery and the CD will be as background music. No indication of singer/player/orchestra etc. would be displayed on the slideshow. This wouldn't infringe the patent right. There is no patent right for Classic. Their composers already passed away long time ago.

Comment and suggestion would be appreciate.

Regards

[TheFu]

It isn't patents. It is copyright law.

If youtube sees it and cares at all, expect your account to be closed for violating copyright terms. Different countries have different copyright laws. In the US, it is usually 125 yrs from the creation date of the copyright item, since all copyrighted material can be sold to non-human entities with unlimited lives.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...yright_lengths says most copyrights are "life + 50 yrs". Different copyrights apply for different creation countries. Ever wondered why CDs have different countries listed on them? I bet it is for copyright reasons.

[satimis]

It isn't patents. It is copyright law.

If youtube sees it and cares at all, expect your account to be closed for violating copyright terms. Different countries have different copyright laws. In the US, it is usually 125 yrs from the creation date of the copyright item, since all copyrighted material can be sold to non-human entities with unlimited lives.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_o...yright_lengths says most copyrights are "life + 50 yrs". Different copyrights apply for different creation countries. Ever wondered why CDs have different countries listed on them? I bet it is for copyright reasons.

The composers of Classics died long time ago. There is no copyright alredy.

Composers:
Beethoven 1770
Paganini 1782
Bach 1685
Mozart 1756
Verdi 1813
Rossini 1792
etc.

I have a good stock of Classical music CDs and VHS tapes in particular Opera. They were purchased in Milano (Milan in English) Italy. Nowadays it is not easy to purchase them. My friends expect to share with them.

I have visited "Teatro alla Scala" (or "La Scala") in Milan, Italy when I was traveling there. I almost have traveled the whole Italy except Sicily.

La Scala
https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Scala

Edit
====
It is NOT easy to get a ticket to "Teatro alla Scala". Tickets are sold several months in advance. How can I get a ticket as a tourist in Milano?

I just waited in the entrance hall of "Teatro alla Scala" for an Italian, having ticket but unable to see the performance. Then I got the ticket in luck. The Italian won't sell the ticket to me with profit added, just the ticket price.

My Italian friend told me this trick. It works 99%

[Holger_Gehrke]

The limiting factor for the duration of copyright on recordings of classical music actually isn't the lifetime of the composer but of the performers. Performing (and recording) a piece of music is seen as a separate act of creation of artwork.

Copyright law does distinguish between 'Legal' and 'Natural' persons as owners of copyrights. For natural persons (a.k.a. humans) it's life + something in most countries while for legal persons (a.k.a. companies) it's a fixed length. There's also a difference between 'work for hire' and independent creation of a work of art but that mostly affects artists working for companies and what rights they have in regards to their creations (this is a topic which is quite important in regards to comics and animation and has led to a lot of interesting legal conflicts).

So recordings of classical music are not out of copyright if they were made in the last 100 or so years. The score is probably public domain, but publishers are pulling the same trick as publishers of classic literature: they add something to the original work (an essay, a biography, a history of notable performances ...) that is new and therefore not out of copyright ...

There are recordings of classical music that are licensed under various creative commons licenses. Kimoko Ishizaka recorded 'Die Goldberg Variationen', 'Das Wohltemperierte Klavier' und 'Die Kunst der Fuge' and published the recordings along with the scores under CC-0; there's also the MusOpen Project which has at least a DVD's worth of mp3s (or flac, but then it's way more than one DVD ...) available under various licenses. You'll also find performances by high school or college orchestras on archive.org that usually have a very liberal license if they mention licensing at all.

If you just want to put some background music to a slide show on YouTube there is an Audio Library on YouTube that you can use.

Holger

[TheFu]

Copyright is important for software too.

Patents are sometimes, but not really as often as they are granted. Most software patents don't deserve the patent. A group of friends went through a list of audio patents related to telephony when MP3 audio was new and filed the same patents again, just with "mp3" instead. The company paid the group $35K for each approved patent and covered the filing fees. They were granted! They tried to do the same for GSM, AAC and all other audio types, but were beaten out by others. Split between their group, it was "new car" time, not "pay off house" time.

[satimis]

The limiting factor for the duration of copyright on recordings of classical music actually isn't the lifetime of the composer but of the performers. Performing (and recording) a piece of music is seen as a separate act of creation of artwork.

It is correct. There is no copyright for classics created by those composers listed on my posting above. You can play their music pieces at any time. But there are copyrights for performance.

There are recordings of classical music that are licensed under various creative commons licenses. Kimoko Ishizaka recorded 'Die Goldberg Variationen', 'Das Wohltemperierte Klavier' und 'Die Kunst der Fuge' and published the recordings along with the scores under CC-0; there's also the MusOpen Project which has at least a DVD's worth of mp3s (or flac, but then it's way more than one DVD ...) available under various licenses. You'll also find performances by high school or college orchestras on archive.org that usually have a very liberal license if they mention licensing at all.

Das Wohltemperierte Klavier (The Well-Tempered Piano) is a performance

Die Kunst der Fuge (The Art of Fugue) is also a performance.
It is an incomplete musical work of unspecified instrumentation by Bach.

If you just want to put some background music to a slide show on YouTube there is an Audio Library on YouTube that you can use.

I'm not in short of background music. I can extract a short piece/theme of the classics as background music.

[TheFu]

"Fair Use" to be 100% safe is 15sec or less.

People can try and push it to 30s, but don't be surprised if those get flagged. Flagging tools are automated by some music producers.

Really comes down to how strict the people who created the audio CDs wants to be. Some artists specifically tell their publishers they don't want the bad press that going after copyright infringement causes. Others are relentless - it was their work product and they want to be paid for any use that isn't clearly meant. Certain high-profile artists/bands are known to be like this. Buying a CD means non-commercial use, in a small, home, venue. Buying a retail CD doesn't convey commercial use license or the right to broadcast. The intended purpose for music CDs is for them to be used "like a book" - by people in the same room. If people in different rooms can hear the same copy from the same original CD, that violates the license intent. In theory, a music CD that gets ripped and is placed on both a home media server AND on your phone would violate the copyright because it is possible for two people in different rooms to listen to the same music at the same time.

Let your conscience be your guide, since we all have different ideas for what is "fair" and there are different laws in different jurisdictions. There are a few countries where optical media sold to home users had a surcharge to pay back the artists for all the infringement that typically happened. https://www.cpcc.ca/en/ is an example.

[satimis]

- snip -

There are a few countries where optical media sold to home users had a surcharge to pay back the artists for all the infringement that typically happened. https://www.cpcc.ca/en/ is an example.

I'm talking on Classics not Hits.

The performance made by;
London Philharmonic Orchestra
New York Philharmonic Orchestra
Boston Symphony Orchestra
Berlin Philharmonic
Accademia Filarmonica Romana
etc.

The performance made by;
Jascha Heifetz (Violinist)
Hilary Hahn (Violinist)
George Enescu (Violinist)
Yehudi Menuhin (Violinist)
etc.

Daniel Barenboim (Pianist)
Vladimir Horowitz (Pianist)
Arthur Rubinstein (Pianist)
etc.

Luciano Pavarotti (Singer)
Renée Fleming (Singer)
Maria Callas (Singer)
Joan Sutherland (Singer)
etc.

Neither I have Hits collection nor having knowledges on Hits.