Hey guys--- as former creative director of a large very active music publishing company and former agent of some of the top writers in the world, I would love to give you guys a few tips. If I had know this stuff when I was younger, I would have retired years ago. As it was, I learned them late in life. 1-Unless there are extraordinary circumstances, I would avoid becoming represented (signed) by almost any music publishing companies. Very few of them actually provide the services which they should, ie, placing songs with other artists and collecting the money which is owed and registering songs with the US Copyright office (The fee is now $40). If you do a little study or get the right partner, you can do this without them. Hang out with successful writers and see how they do things. Another problem with major publishers is that they are soooooo busy that unless there are over several thousands owing in other countries, they simply don't collect. Jerks. The worst part is that you will never know anything about it unless you are making some effort to find out if your tunes are in another country. 2-In order to do this you need to be a member of ASCAP/BMI or SESAC. To become an ASCAP writer member, you must have written or co-written a musical composition or a song that has been either commercially recorded (CD, record, tape, etc.); or, performed publicly in any venue licensable by ASCAP (club, live concert, symphonic concert or recital venue, college or university, etc.); or, performed in any audio visual or electronic medium (film, television, radio, Internet, cable, pay-per-view, etc.);or, published and available for sale or rental---in other words, your song must be generating income. If your songs are about to be released, join anyway and explain this in the application. They will sign you right up. BMI and Ascap dont' have anything to do with collecting royalties from CD or other sales. Their major purpose is to collect and pay you "performance" royalties, ie, the money that the radio stations OWE YOU for using (playing) your songs. You cannot be member of both-- you have to choose one. If you have airplay, you let them know (register your songs with them) and they then begin to pay your publishing company. You can either have a writer/publishing company or one with an original name. Simply call the "index department" and they will clear the name that you propose. On their websites (ascap.com or bmi.com) under "membership" you can fill out applications online. This is extremely important because many artists don't even collect their money because most of them are under the impression that royalties come from record companies. They do--- but the income from BMI/ASCAP can be double or triple. Your song might never sell a single copy but if it gets airplay-- even by accident (which I have seen many times) it could be generating thousands of dollars. Check this out: if you don't collect your money within a certain period of time, it reverts back and it is basically lost forever. So, register your tunes. If you have any questions, let me know. t ----- Original Message ----- From: Chris Coccia To: Logic_Cafe@yahoogroups.com Sent: Tuesday, April 03, 2007 2:53 PM Subject: Re: [Logic_Cafe] off topic : setting up a myspace music site GAmoore@... wrote: > I setup a Broadjam account and listed your name as the reference, Andy. By > the way, is it time to join BMI or ASCAP if you are going to start selling > stuff? > Unless youve got a head for the business side of it.. BMI/ASCAP can be a pain.. To start you have to be publishing your work to even submit it there. Meaning you either have to be dealing with a publishing company or you need to go setup a new bank account as a business and become a publisher (or a DBA kinda thing as well).. I never could get anyone at ASCAP to tell me how to properly go about this (even though they claim to have tons of advisors and help for their 'artists') and gave up. The best, and first, thing you want to do now is simply to get your work copywritten with the Government's copyright office. Just download a simple PDF, send em a copy of your entire album (that saves you from paying $30 for EACH song, just register it as an entire work and theyre all covered), and a $30 fee (might have gone up last time I put anything out was 3 years ago).. Then its on record and you officially own the recordings to do whatever you wish. You can worry about the BMI/ASCAP side of publishing once you start recieving airplay and people wanting to perform your material as this is really all that those companies do is monitor the numbers on that stuff.. I dont believe they account for anything like album sales which is probably what most of us 'non-major' folks will be doing with our wares around at shows and such.. -- Chris http://www.monotrematamusic.com http://www.myspace.com/monotremata http://www.descentrecords.com [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Re: [Logic_Cafe] music publishing biz
2007-04-05 by Tim McLane