Franko can’t sing!

Can you imagine!  There I was, reading, reading, reading for the audiobook version of Illusion, and when I came to the part where Mandy does her Elvis impression, singing “Heartbreak Hotel,” the director stopped me and said, “You can’t sing that, it’s copyrighted.”

Oh.  Well, right.  Sure.  I guess I knew that.  So I had to stumble through that song without actually singing it which had to sound kind of weird.  People might think, “This Peretti guy can’t carry a tune in a bucket.”

Then came a song by the Beach Boys and I couldn’t sing that one either.

Then … are you ready for this?  I was reading the scene in which Mandy bakes Dane a cake and sings him Happy Birthday and the director had to stop me again.  ”Sorry.  You can’t sing that either, it’s copyrighted.”

Happy Birthday?  Copyrighted?  That’s right.  Some outfit, in an exquisite showing of avarice, and hoping to leech royalties from anyone and everyone who sings that song in any recording or any public concert or movie or TV show, has bought the rights for millions of dollars.  Well.  Guess it’s time to come up with a new Happy Birthday song.  I’m working on one so my worship team can sing it to folks in church with birthdays.

And I’m NOT going to copyright it!

Just forgive me for not singing the songs on the audiobook.  I really can string notes together well enough for the song to be recognizable … you just wouldn’t know it.

Anyway, the audiobook is fun, fun, fun … unless your Daddy takes your iPod away …

Listen to an excerpt or you can order the whole thing here:  http://frankperetti.com/?p=353

Frank