Fight Songs

Marketplace had an interesting story today about ownership of a school’s “fight song”. The particular song examined is Auburn University’s fight song, “War Eagle“. It was especially fun for me because Auburn is where I received my undergrad. The story opens with the song being played out of some unidentified trinket, which I’m willing to bet was this bottle opener (warning, linked site plays audio without asking). I’d bet on it because I’ve got one sitting in my kitchen.

An Auburn alumn commissioned two prominent songwriters out of New York, Robert Allen and Al Stillman, to create the song. From Auburn’s school paper:

Allen began writing music in 1952. It was two years after that prominent Auburn alumnus Roy B. Sewell sought out what he considered the best of the big-city songwriters — Allen and Stillman — and commissioned them to write a song “to express the spirit which has sparked the Tigers’ amazing football comeback.”

Sewell, who called it “a peach of song,” presented it as a gift to the Auburn Alumni Association.

Of course, Sewell assumed that having paid for the song, it belonged to him. And I would guess by giving it as a gift, further assumed it would belong to the university. From the Marketplace story:

In fact, the songwriters retained the rights. They then sold the rights on to a music publisher. Fifty years later, Carlin America bought them.

Here’s the Carlin America site. For some reason, “War Eagle” doesn’t show up in their search or in their list of all songs owned. Which is odd since the collection of fight songs they purchased makes them $100,000 a year. But I don’t feel too bad for Auburn:

The school makes more than $2 million a year licensing everything from barbecues to Christmas ornaments.

And don’t forget bottle openers!