Category Archives: Musician Issues

Songwriters Are Losing $2.3 Billion A Year Due To Outdated Government Regulations/BuzzFeed

Post by trichordist

Right now a byzantine system is in place that not only dates back more than 70 years but also differs depending on the distribution platform. Traditional radio stations, for instance, pay royalties to the composer of a song, but not to the artist or band performing it — known in industry parlance as a performance right — if they are different. Sirius XM only pays royalties for songs released after 1972. Pandora does pay government-mandated royalties to songwriters but has been aggressively lobbying regulators to lower the rate in recent years. Use of music in both professional and user-based content on YouTube and other websites and in TV shows or commercials is yet another category of music licensing, with the difference being that it is free-market-based and not subject to government oversight.

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DIY Musician Podcast: Episode #131- Ari Herstand…Should You Pay to Play?

Text by Sohrab Saadat Ladjevardi

I totally agree with Ari in all the things he says in this podcast interview about how “freelancing” musicians or bands need to deal with clubs.. Actually, I’ve been advising musicians around me almost the same things. I think that the time has come that musicians and bands know how to deal with clubs. Yes, you can’t play for free anymore, as far as you’re professional and live from your music. But you have to collaborate with clubs to make a gig a success. As a musician you need to know what your responsibilities are. You need to know how clubs make business. You just can’t ask for a guaranty and expect that a crowd will show up. On the contrary, it’s very important that musicians can negotiate things with the clubs. You have to be flexible in your demands. Being a musician means to be the composer-performer and your own manager at the same time. In fact, you make yourself famous and the clubs could be a great help for you. But you need to know how to deal and work with them.

Post from CD BABY postcast: http://cdbabypodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/DIYMusicianPodcast_Episode131.mp3

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Future of Music: Newsletter #120 (March 11, 2014)

Greetings, FMC friends! After a long and cold winter, many of us are excited to be escaping to the sunshine of Austin, Texas this week for great music, excellent tacos, and a jampacked SXSW schedule. Meanwhile, there’s plenty of excitement heating up in the world of policy. Read on for all the latest happenings.

1.  FMC On The Road: SXSW
2.  Artist Revenue Streams: New Case Study!
3.  Comcast/Time Warner Cable Merger: Bad News For Musicians
4.  On Copyright: Congressional Hearings Resume
5.  Health Care Update
6.  Best of the Blog
7.  Work for FMC
8.  SF MusicTech: Register Now!
9.  How Are We Doing?

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