Melchior Rietveldt

Melchior Rietveldt (b. 1971, Nieuwerkerk aan den IJssel) is a Dutch composer, producer, and recording engineer, son of Benny Rietveldt (1940—2015) and the brother of John Christie (b. 1963). Rietveldt collaborated with Studio 88, Hilversum as a freelance music director from 1988 to 2003 and served as CEO of Music Entertainment Agency (1990–94). He's the founder and owner of MBR Productions since 1994. Rietveldt began his career as a child pop singer under his first name Melchior, with a debut 7" single, , released when he was only eight. The following year, Melchior was signed by Telstar (2). His major breakthrough came with 7" in 1983, a remake of a title song from Steven Spielberg's blockbuster ET: The Extra-Terrestrial that peaked at 14th position in Holland's Top 40 chart. In 1985, Melchior debuted as a movie actor, starring in a popular children's TV film Pompy de Robodoll. By 1989, as Melchior turned eighteen, he began working as an arranger, producer, and studio engineer. In 2006, Rietveldt was commissioned by BREIN (Bescherming Rechten Entertainment Industrie Nederland), an association for the Dutch record industry and movie studios, to compose a jingle for an anti-piracy advertisement at a local film festival. After discovering the same ad widely circulated on dozens of commercial DVD film releases without his permission, Melchior reached out to BUMA/Stemra, the Dutch collecting society for composers and music publishers, for help in allocating all unpaid royalties. However, Buma/Stemra only offered him a small advance payment and refused to collect and provide detailed statistics on the actual usage of his music. (Multiple online sources, including major news outlets, erroneously reported that it was a widespread US anti-piracy commercial, "Piracy: It's a Theft," also known as "You Wouldn't Steal a Car," which was instead produced in July 2004 by MPAA and is unrelated to Rietveldt's legal case.) In late 2011, Jochem Gerrits, Buma/Stemra board member and the founder of label and publisher High Fashion Music B.V., approached Rietveldt and promised a prompt recovery of all unpaid royalties, in exchange for signing over the rights to Melchior's music to High Fashion so that Gerrits could collect his unofficial "payoff" in the form of 33% of all mechanical rights through the label. Rietveldt declined the offer and went to press, exposing this corruption on PowNews, the country's leading news channel. A massive publicity scandal ensued, forcing Gerrits to resign from his position at Buma/Stemra. Rietveldt subsequently sued the collective agency, awarded over €164,000 in damages.