The libretto of Il Tabarro is in the public domain in the United States. In most European countries, it is under copyright protection. These web pages are intended for the use only in the United States and other countries where it is legal. (See guidelines below.)
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I have confirmed the copyright status for the Tabarro libretto for the following countries:
| Austria | protected |
| Germany | protected |
| Italy | protected |
| United States | public domain |
These are accurate as of this writing (Oct. 15, 1999).
An EC directive requests member governments to extend copyright protection until at least 70 years after the death of the longest-surviving author. The author of the Tabarro libretto, Giuseppe Adami, died in 1946, so under this rule, the libretto would be protected until 2016.
The EC directive does not itself have the force of law; it is a request to member governments to make such a law. It is possible that some member governments will choose not to observe the request, or will choose to apply the new term only to newly published works, but I have no specific knowledge of any exceptions. Many European governments already offered the specified copyright term even before the EC directive.
United States law has recently been amended to align with the EC directive, but the new protection applies only to works published after 1978. For older works, copyright term is still calculated from the date of publication, and any work published before 1923 is in the public domain in the United States. (The Tabarro libretto was published in 1918.) I understand that copyright law in Canada and Australia is similar to that of the United States, but I don't know the details.
More copyright discussion.
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