In this chapter of 3 Minutes of Knowledge we want to address the big picture of music rights.
As an artist in today’s music industry, your job is to create music…consistently and of highest quality possible….you want to stand out and you want to be noticed. Creating music is part of the equation, but social media, video content and other promotional content all help drive views, likes and streams.
But it’s not enough…
Making quality and consistent music driven by creative content is no longer your only gig, in order to succeed, you need to understand the Business of Music.
As you release your music through a digital distributor you are earning revenue on streaming income. You’re off to a great start to creating consistent revenue.
There are several other ways your music is earning revenue that you may not be collecting on.
Let’s make this confusing issue a little easier to understand.
As it related to monetization, all recorded music consists of 2 main parts.
There are no exceptions to this rule and while it does get a bit more complicated, let’s begin here.
Picture your song as a pizza….now, cut that pizza in two equal halves.
Part 1: This part is called the “Master Sound Recording” or, just use the shorthand version and refer to this as the Master Share.
Historically, this has part of the recording has often been called the “Label Share” as this is the actual recording of the song that has historically been owned by a record label.
Any streaming revenue collected through your digital distributor consists of revenue from the “Master Side” of the recording.
Part 2: The second half of the revenue pizza is referred to as “Publisher Share”.
This 50% consists of payments to writers of the track and performance royalties for how and where your music is used or performed.
To make it easy to understand, take the half of the pizza consisting of “Publisher Share” and cut that half into two equal parts.
Part 1 - 50% of the Publisher Share is paid to the writer or writers of the track. In order to collect this share you must register with a Performance Rights Organization or, commonly referred to as “PRO”.
NOTE: Registering for a PRO is NOT a publishing deal. This will only collect on part of your publishing.
Part 2 - 50% of the Publisher Share collects on “Performance Royalties”. This 50% of the publishing revenue is often collected by a publishing company who are responsible for the marketing of your track as well as the collection from a variety of revenue sources.
THIS part is what it recognized as a Publishing Deal.
It is safe to assume that you WILL need a Publisher to help you do this.
Again, if you are an independent artist who wrote your own music and self released it, you are also able to collect on your writer share AND your publisher share as outlined in Section 2.
Now, the most interesting and often misunderstood piece of royalty pizza is Soundexchange.
Soundexchange was created by the Federal Government in 2003 as digital music services came to prominence. Laws regarding royalties needed to be updated in order to collect from digital services and streaming services.
In today’s marketplace, this encompasses quite a large amount of music streaming and online radio.
Like we outlined above, there are two ways to collect money from Soundexchange, although these two shares are defined slightly differently than the two ways explained above.
Part 1: Soundexchange pays 50% of revenue to the Sound Recording Owner, or “Master Owner”.
Part 2: The remaining 50% of revenue is paid to the Performer or Featured Artist.
For emphasis, if you are an indie artist and are self-releasing your music you may be entitled to BOTH revenue streams.
We specialize in music and in artist services, as such we have helped independent artists and labels find, collect, register and organize their content.
We can find revenue, even provide advance on this revenue on a case by case basis, ask us if you qualify.
There are many cases in which we find missing revenue or uncollected revenue and redirect it to our clients.
Just like your tracks, every artist and every release is unique and individual.
As such, our customized plans help to insure that the business end of your music career is maximized so you can continue to create… and collect the cash.
Let’s get serious about the business of music.
