Tenor Joseph Calleja and his wife soprano Tatiana Lisnic yesterday filed a judicial protest against a production house and the state television station for advertising the sale of DVDs of their concert without authorisation.
Mr Calleja and Ms Lisnic filed the protest against Renaissance Productions Ltd and the Public Broadcasting Services (PBS).
Mr Calleja and Ms Lisnic claimed that on December 19, 2006, they signed a contract with Renaissance Productions in which they agreed to perform during a concert in Mdina on July 7 called Joseph Calleja 10th Anniversary Concert.
In the contract it was also agreed that Renaissance would have the right to film the concert and broadcast it in Malta on two occasions. This was to happen after the recording was examined and approved by Mr Calleja and Ms Lisnic and this so that they would protect their artistic integrity and their profession.
It was never discussed, or agreed, that Renaissance would be involved in the sale of the concert's recordings.
Some time after the concert, Renaissance gave PBS a DVD of the recorded concert "in raw form", that is, unedited.
On July 20, Mr Calleja sent an e-mail to Renaissance requesting a "clean copy" of the recording, that is, the copy that was going to be broadcast.
The request was made so that they would examine the recording as outlined in the December 2006 contract. A follow-up e-mail was sent on July 24, but Renaissance did not reply to the e-mail, the couple claimed.
In the following days, PBS aired an advert in which it invited the public to book a copy of the DVD of the Mdina concert. Mr Calleja and Ms Lisnic then learnt that PBS was going to distribute the DVDs under a profit sharing agreement with Renaissance.
They argued that this was in breach of the December contract. Not only were they not going to be allowed to examine the recording of the concert, but Renaissance and PBS were going to sell DVDs of that recording when they were never given the right to do so.
Mr Calleja and Ms Lisnic said that, apart from being financially detrimental to them, this could also have a negative impact of their artistic career.
They called on Renaissance and PBS to stop circulating or distributing these DVDs or any other recording of the concert. They also called on them not to broadcast any recording before it was examined according to the contract. Finally, Mr Calleja and his wife held Renaissance and PBS liable for any damages suffered.
Lawyer Franco Vassallo signed the protest.