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85 F.3d 774, 44 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 687 (Cite as: 85 F.3d 774)Paul F. AHERN, d/b/a Ahern Associates, Plaintiff-Appellee, v.
Donald Thomas SCHOLZ, Defendant-Appellant. Nos. 951146, 951147, 951203 and 951204. United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit. Heard Dec. 4, 1995. Decided June 4,
1996. David C. Phillips and David M. Given were on brief for Paul F. Ahern. Manager (Ahern) sued songwriter, seeking to recover damages for breach of "Further Modification
Agreement" (FMA) under which songwriter was to pay manager out of revenues from his third record album. Songwriter counterclaimed, alleging failure of manager to pay songwriter for first and second albums, as
required under "Modification Agreement" (MA). The United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts, Edward F. Harrington, J., entered judgment on jury verdict for manager, awarded manager
attorney fees and costs, and denied counterclaims. Songwriter appealed. The Court of Appeals, Torruella, Chief Judge, held that: (1) jury could find that manager had not breached terms of MA, even though
manager had not paid all amounts due songwriter from first and second albums; (2) jury could find that songwriter had breached FMA by making invalid deductions from gross amounts of royalties due for third album, so as
to deny manager his share of royalties; (3) trial court committed harmless error, at most, in allowing manager to call songwriter's attorney to testify as expert on whether legal fees were customary deduction from
royalty agreements of type found in present case; (4) trial court could deny songwriter's motion for continuance, in order to obtain new counsel; (5) songwriter had stated cause of action for rescission of his waiver of
deadline for receipt of revenues on which payment to manager would be owed, under terms of FMA, based upon manager's failure to pay all sums owed to songwriter under MA; (6) manager had not violated Massachusetts
deceptive practices act. Affirmed in part; reversed in part and remanded. More
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