Will UMG release 200 Motels Soundtrack?

[Bill]

Take wiki entries with grain of salt:

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Artists_Records

"Many of these soundtracks have reverted back to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer,
whose MGM Music unit (no connection with the now-defunct MGM Records)
in turn have licensed them out to other labels for reissue; first
Rykodisc, and more recently, Universal Music and EMI (the Fiddler on
the Roof movie soundtrack). However, it is Sony, which now owns
Columbia Records (and now a stake in MGM as well), that has released
the West Side Story original cast album and film soundtrack on CD."

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MGM_Music

"In 1986, after Ted Turner sold MGM to Kirk Kerkorian, MGM formed MGM
Music for the licensing of music of which MGM owns the rights. Turner
kept the MGM film library and rights to the soundtracks. MGM Music
focuses on releasing soundtracks. It manages the music and music
publishing rights of MGM films made after Turner sold the company as
well as the music and music publishing rights of United Artists and
Orion films.[1]
While MGM Music utilizes unrelated record companies to release
soundtracks MGM owns, they did issue a limited edition CD on their own,
the Thunderbird 6 soundtrack album[2] with only 1,500 copies made.[3]
"MGM founded MGM Records in 1946, but was sold to PolyGram in 1972
including rights to the MGM Records name plus a 10 year license to use
the MGM lion logo. MGM Records, including its artists, was absorbed
into PolyGram's Polydor Records in 1976. However, after its absorption,
PolyGram continued releasing MGM soundtrack albums and reissues until
1982. Turner parent Time Warner now owns the rights to MGM soundtracks
issued by MGM/PolyGram Records which are licensed to former TW
subsidiary Rhino Entertainment."
[Footnotes available on original web page]
===============================

Since 200 Motels was originally released on United Artists, it would
appear that the rights are owned by MGM Music, who could license it to
Universal Music Group (UMG ), as they previously licensed to Ryko for 5
years.

It seems as though MGM and UMG have agreements and mechanisms in place
to release MGM soundtracks and it probably would not be much of an
effort to license 200 Motels to UMG.

It is UMG that is re-releasing the Ryko Zappa catalog. ZFT and UMG are
working together on friendly terms (for now, at least), so it seems
natural to eventually add 200 Motels to the catalog (at least on a temp
basis, like the deal with Ryko).

I wonder if the soundtrack only exists now as a two track master or can
be refurbished from tapes in the vault.


--
Bill