The Council of Europe, though less than pleased with Rhodesia's selection, did not object to it, reasoning that so long as Rhodesia was using "Ode to Joy" in its original form, it could not be subject to reproach as the music was long out of copyright and in the public domain. It did announce, however, that should Rhodesia use the same arrangement as the Council of Europe, then the author of that score, Herbert von Karajan, would have grounds for a plagiarism lawsuit. Such an incident was averted when Rhodesia adopted an original sixteen-bar arrangement by Captain Ken MacDonald, the Rhodesian African Rifles' bandmaster. The anthem's inaugural instrumental performance in Salisbury provoked mixed reactions: some were enthusiastic—including a coloured sergeant musician who proudly told the "Rhodesia Herald" that "it's just like 'God Save Our Gracious Queen'"—but many others were disappointed that the government had not commissioned an original tune. Rhys Lewis, music critic for the "Herald", wrote that he was "stupefied" by the government's choice, which he said was not only unoriginal, but also so associated with supranational brotherhood that it risked making internationally isolated Rhodesia the subject of ridicule. Phinias Sithole, who headed the African Trade Union Congress (a black Rhodesian trade union federation), commented that he did not believe most of the country's blacks would identify with a song chosen while people of their ethnicity remained largely absent from the government's top levels.