The future of a music festival set up in honour of Frank Zappa is in doubt following a lawsuit brought against the organisers by Zappa's widow Gail, demanding £200,000 for the right to use her late husband's name.
The Zappanale festival has been running in the German village of Bad Doberan since 1990 as a way of celebrating the records of the avant-garde musician whose records had previously been illegal under the East German Communist regime. Gail Zappa, who formed the Zappa Family Trust in 2002, is demanding that she has a say in which Zappa tribute acts play the event, that the festival's logo - Frank Zappa's trademark moustache and goatee - be scrapped, that a statue of the musician in the village be pulled down and that the organizers pay £200,000 for the right to use the Zappa name.
However, the festival's organisers say they took out a "patent" (or trademark, you'd think, but I'm not sure) on the Zappanale name almost 20 years ago, and therefore, in the words of the president of the society who promote the event, Thomas Dippel: "It's our opinion that we own the rights to the name". He also told reporters that the festival did not expect to make a profit and was already £120,000 in debt.
A Dusseldorf court will consider the dispute.