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Home arrow Older News Archive arrow Wall Royalties claim - update
Wall Royalties claim - update Print E-mail
Written by Matt   
Sunday, 05 December 2004

The current story regarding the Pink Floyd / Another Brick In The Wall royalties claim, which has made headlines worldwide, has resulted in some newspapers devoting plenty of column space to it. Today's Times newspaper in the UK features a follow-up story, entitled "All in all, we want education". The article, written by Adam Luck, focuses on the children who sang on the song, having tracked down a significant number of them. Luck found that "as well as pursuing a legal action for unpaid royalties from the song, they are now singing from a rather different hymn sheet."

He reports:

Ian Abbott, 40, was one of 13 pupils whom their music teacher, Alun Renshaw, sneaked into the Britannia Row studios to record the chorus for the song in 1979. "We don’t need no education does not hold, especially with children," he said at the weekend. "Some of my nieces, for example, have been having problems at school. I say to them: ‘You must knuckle down’, and they say: ‘But why? Look at what you sang’. But education is so important. I really regret the fact that I did not do an awful lot at school and I would like to go to university now and get a degree. But work gets in the way when you get older."

Another member of the choir, Mirabai Narayan, the granddaughter of Stephen Swingler, the former Labour minister, 'is now a learning mentor dealing with problem children at a primary school in Camden. She said: "It’s strange now because I do wonder whether that song has influenced my choice of career. My job now is to help to overcome barriers to learning for kids and if I listen to the song now it makes me shiver - especially the line about ‘dark sarcasm’. Nowadays as teachers we are told never to use sarcasm with children."

Peter Rowan, an Edinburgh royalties expert, is behind the claim, and has been trying to track down the former pupils for two years. Rowan will lodge their claims with PAMRA (the Performing Artists’ Media Rights Association), which distributes money from broadcasters. The Times notes though, that "there will be no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Mr Rowan said: "They will not be getting more than a few hundred pounds. But it’s also about the recognition. They never got that in 1979. They deserve it even if it has taken 25 years."

The article, which can be read in full here, concludes with a look at what has happened to each of the children since their starring role in 1979.

 
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