A rum deal over Cuban music

It was the movie credited with introducing vintage Cuban music to a global audience.

But the legacy of The Buena Vista Social Club, which documented the political difficulties of staging a Cuban music concert in America, is proving anything but harmonious.

And yesterday, the battle for the rights to the songs in the 1999 film spilt over into London's High Court.

American firm Peer International Corporation claims it legitimately bought the copyright to more than 600 songs, including most of the 14 on the soundtrack, in the 1930s.

But families of the songwriters, now all dead, claim they were never paid properly for their work.

They allege the company exploited them, making them settle for 'a few pesos and maybe a drink of rum'.

Pushpinder Saini, representing PIC, said it paid royalties to the composers before Fidel Castro came to power in Cuba in 1959.

After America imposed a trade embargo, they continued to pay USbased artists and set up bank accounts for those who remained on the island.

Mr Saini accused Editora Musical de Cuba, a group claiming to to represent the families, of being a pawn of Mr Castro's government, which wanted to pocket the profits for itself.

'It is certainly agreed to be under the direction and control of the Cuban ministry of the interior,' he said.

But Peter Prescott QC, for EMC, promised to prove Peer had not been paying the composers either before or since the revolution.

'These contracts were so cunningly contrived as to allow the publishers to get away with paying the composers practically nothing,' he said.

The dispute has come to London, because EMC allies Termidor Music Publishers tried to register themselves as British copyright-holders.

The case continues.