Norman v Future Publishing

[Michel]

In law, I am currently studying defamation, and I just came across a case involving Jesse Norman suing for libel that I thought I would share with you because it made me laugh.

In 1999, she sued Future Publishing (although I am not actually sure what magazine it featured in) because it said, despite an otherwise overall positive review, the following comment:

'This is a women who got trapped in swing doors on her way to a concert, and when advised to release herself by turning sideways replied: "Honey, I ain't got no sideways"

[MishaK]

'This is a women who got trapped in swing doors on her way to a concert, and when advised to release herself by turning sideways replied: "Honey, I ain't got no sideways"

If the quote is accurate, they should also be sued for perpetuating the grammatical abomination of not distinguishing properly between plural and singular of the female version of homo sapiens.

[Wendell_E]

Can they also be sued for re-using a really old joke?  I've heard the "I don't have a sideways" joke about several singers over the years (usually Ernestine Schumann Heink).  I found this on the internet:

As she walked into a concert hall in San Francisco one evening, she knocked over some musicians' stands. And on her way out, she knocked over some more stands. So the stage manager said to her, 'Madame Schumann-Heink, perhaps when you go out for the second part of the program, you could walk sideways?' And Schumann-Heink replied, 'Young man, I have no sideways.'"

http://www.stanfordalumni.org/news/magazine/2003/janfeb/features/sound.html

On this page it's Luisa Tetrazzini:

http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/2004/05/17/2004-05-17_no_sideways_living_large_at_.html

And here's another story that tells it about a non-operasinger:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/history/special/131christians/chesterton.html

[knight66]

The Magazine was Classic CD Magazine. It was the first in the UK to put a cover disc on its front cover and it is why Gramophone also ended up putting a disc out with its publication.

The case may have been partly responsible for its demise. She never said it and got damages. It was a brain dead thing to write and she was particularly humorless about the incident.

Mike

[Pierre]

The Magazine was Classic CD Magazine. It was the first in the UK to put a cover disc on its front cover and it is why Gramophone also ended up putting a disc out with its publication.

The case may have been partly responsible for its demise. She never said it and got damages. It was a brain dead thing to write and she was particularly humorless about the incident.

Mike

I'm sure Michel will put you right on this, but I thought I'd butt in anyway. Norman didn't get damages: she tried suing Future Publishing in the British courts, and the judge said - I'm paraphrasing here - that it was a pity Norman didn't show a sense of humour on par with what the author of the article credited her with, and pointed out that overall tone of the article was clearly laudatory. She lost the case.

AFAIK, Classic CD didn't shut down because of this. It ran until 2000, and collapsed ultimately through a confused editorial policy where, in the face of competition from BBC Music, it evidently tried to chase too many types of readers and so failed to devote sufficient space on any particular genre. I say this as a once devoted reader of the mag - seeing its decline after an excellent (well-written if not always well-informed, intelligent and certainly entertaining) first couple of years or so (it launched in 1990) was almost as desperate a spectacle as seeing what's happening with Gramophone today.

[knight66]

Thanks, I read that she got damages, but that beyond that, the court costs were considerable. I am happy to accept what you say.

Classic CD was one of a stable of magazines from Future Publishing, a substantial publisher. It was not a little independent publication.

Mike

[Pierre]

Thanks, I read that she got damages, but that beyond that, the court costs were considerable. I am happy to accept what you say.

Thanks.

Classic CD was one of a stable of magazines from Future Publishing, a substantial publisher. It was not a little independent publication.

Mike

Not sure what point you're making here. Publishers, no matter how substantial (and I'm not sure Future was as big in the 1990s as it is now), run magazines - especially smaller circulation ones (for instance, specialist classical magazines such as Classic CD and Gramophone) - on a tightly managed budget and tend to be quite ruthless at shutting down publications which either fail to be profitable or which they can't see fitting any longer into their portfolio.

[knight66]

I was not making a point; merely giving some information.

Mike

[Anne]

I'm trying to relocate a CD where J. Norman sang that last gorgeous part of Isolde's singing at the end of Tristan und Isolde.  It sent chills down the spine and now I can't find it again.  Anyone know which recording I'm talking about>

[uffeviking]

If you are ref. to Isolde's Transfiguration it's on the video Karajan in Salzburg, a documentary about the conductor. I don't know if it has been issued on CD.

[Tsaraslondon]

I'm trying to relocate a CD where J. Norman sang that last gorgeous part of Isolde's singing at the end of Tristan und Isolde.  It sent chills down the spine and now I can't find it again.  Anyone know which recording I'm talking about>

This is the original CD, but it may well have been reissued by now

http://www.amazon.com/Wagner-Tannh%C3%A4user-Siegfried-Idyll-Tristan-Isolde/dp/B000001G9H/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1204113559&sr=1-1

[Wendell_E]

Norman recorded the Transfiguration (Verklärung), or as it is often, if improperly, called Liebestod at least three times.  Here are links to those recordings at amazon.com:

Colin Davis/London Symphony Orchestra/Philips Also includes the Wesendonk Lieder and the Tristan Prelude.

Karajan/Vienna Philharmonic/DG Norman only sings on the single track.  It also inclues the Tristan Prelude, Tannhäuser Overture, and Siegfried Idyll.

Tennstedt/London Philharmonic/EMI  This is just a MP3 download of the single track.  They don't have the whole CD. 

The Philips recording is also available in other couplings ("The Essential Jessye Norman", "A Wagner Collection") and all three recordings are available as MP3 downloads.  Just type Norman Liebestod in the amazon.com search box and they'll all be listed.