Newton’s Three Notes

In response to the issue of the Beastie Boys’ use of sampling the musical sound from composer-flutist James Newton’s recorded composition “Choir” (“A Musician Writes It, a Rapper Borrows It; A Swap or a Threat?” by Geoff Boucher, Sept. 21), Beastie Boys member Adam Yauch misses the point when he states, “What we used is three notes and three notes do not constitute a composition.”

It is not the three notes that they used, it is the unmistakable sound of those three notes of James Newton in both his performance and composition.

If the Beastie Boys wanted three notes, they could have hired any composer to compose them and any flutist to record them. The Beastie Boys did not want any three notes. They wanted Newton’s sound in his composition “Choir,” because that is what they liked.

JON JANG

San Francisco