Song Copyright

The copyright is the single most important asset in the music business. Without copyright law, anybody can record and sell the song you wrote without your permission and without paying you on top of it. You don’t want that. You want to eliminate all chances of having to compete with other artists recording the song you wrote in all your infinite creative wisdom. The two most important copyrightable works in the music business are songs and sound recordings.

Song copyrights belong to you if you wrote the song. But you need to register the song with the United States Copyright Office. This is important because it will hold up in court as evidence that you are the rightful owner of the copyright.

Technically once you’ve recorded the song, wither on paper or CD or whatever, you are the copyright owner. However, try using a piece of scribbled notebook paper in court as evidence. Can you prove when you recorded that song at home if somebody else releases it? No you can’t. So the best thing to do is just register your songs and get it over with.

Before you ask me about mailing yourself a sealed notarized copy of the written out music and lyrics or recording and never opening it, let me ask you something your should ask every person who spouts these kinds of theories. Do you really think that has a 100% chance of holding up in court? Not only is it unlikely to hold up, it’s actually more time consuming than registering the song.

In regards to contracts with labels and publishing companies, it’s ok to sign over exclusive rights to your songs for a certain period of time, and for a certain amount of money for that matter, but never ever ever sign over the full copyright. You will lose all future ability to profit off of that song. It’s standard for you to sign over a portion of what’s known as the publishers share, but never sign over any of the songwriters share. The songwriter’s share is 50% of the copyright and the publisher’s share is 50% as well.

In regards to sound recording copyrights, the label will own them. This is the rights to the “masters” you hear everyone talking about in movies about the business. Unless you’re a big artist with a lot of clout you will never own the rights to the master recordings. However, if you are the songwriter as well as the performer, you will be paid separate amounts for both in a traditional contract. In the newer “360 deals” your probably more likely to get a flat overall rate, especially if you sign with an indie label.

I hope this clears up some confusion about song copyrights and how they work into your career. We’ll touch on negotiating the royalties and copyright ownerships in a future post.

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Until next time.