JPF Home Page Forums General Messages General Message Forum Royalties to producers, mixers and sound engineers

There's a bill to amend title 17 of the US code.

Its for payments of royalties to producers, mixers and sound engineers.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2625

So if you're a writer that also mix and produce your own music, will we be entitled to these royalties as well as the writers royalties? Probably not, but the wording to the exceptions will be interesting read.

John

I've always been under the impression that these folks (talents for the most part) were paid by the label or studio who hired them. Another wedge of the song-writing pie taken from the song-writer who immediately gives up half to the Publisher... then has his/her slice further reduced by the number of co-writers. Darn Senate! May they rot on their many perks and privileges.

Thanks for letting us know, Jody. ----Dave

Hmmmmm.....

Producers, mixers and sound engineers usually work on a fixed fee basis. Does this mean downward pressure will be applied on wages because they'll "get rich" from royalties ?

Sounds like a bad idea to me.

cheers, niteshift

Actually most producers and such, that are worth their salt will ask for what is known as 'points' on a recording. Those points are royalties based on sales, streaming etc. I'm under the impression that this will make it easier to direct payments owed to the person themselves. That way its not on the label/publisher/artist to pay it out or get taxed on said royalties.

That doesn't seem odd to me at all. When it comes to hit records, it's all about the recordings and production. I don't care how good the song is, it won't be a. hit without those guys. So not surprising that they get royalties.

People dont buy songs, they buy recordings of songs.

Sounds a little like a "tax" to me! LOL! If payments are made to Producers (and engineers) won't the proceeds from the sale of each song then go to that portion allocated to the Producer, et al... and still come out of the "pot" that contains all the money the song earns from sales? I'm asking because this is a new scheme and usually, new schemes are intended to rob Peter (the Song-writer) in order to pay Paul (the Producer, Engineer, Janitor... etc, etc, etc.) LOL!

What a world! Song-writers always seem to "pull the train." This is bound to effect the existing world-wide agreements between Nations. The "little guy" really doesn't have a chance in this rigged system.

I guess it depends what scale the releases are at.

Some actors get a portion of the box office sales, as well as getting paid to make the film. You could say, why do they need more than their salary?

Greed? Maybe, but that's business as usual in The entertainment industry

Top notch producers and engineers probably won't do it unless they get royalties.

Laughably, I went to a recording studio here locally. The guy was awful, he didn't know how to mix, had very little ear, and zero musical training. And before we did the project, he gave me a piece of paper picking which option I wanted. Did I want a higher rate for his services and no royalty, or a lower rate and a royalty

Once I stopped giggling, I said, dude I'm recording a demo, there won't be any royalties, and I'll pay you 25 an hour for your studio, In Fact, you can leave and come back when I'm done

He actually laughed, and said do what you want....

Ahhh the good ole days

Eh, Well,
Pro royalties are paid directly to the Publisher and Songwriter's as indicated on the Works Registration form. If other people are going to receive Pro Royalties it would have to be listed on the Works Registration form. The only songs that generate any Pro money have to be played on the radio and have huge amounts of play. Producers, Label people, even Artists get money up front on Major Labels. Musicians get paid up front. The song writer(s) who may have to split some of their royalties with others only get paid if the song is recorded and released. This is a Bum Idea, at best.

Well recorded music doesn't make much money these days anyway, with a small percentage of an exception.

But technically, if somebody plays drums on your recording, and the recording goes on to make some money, he could sue for performance royalties.

Unless you get some contract before hand saying you are hiring him to play on the recording and that is it.

I guess everybody wants to give themselves a chance to be part of something that could possibly take off at some point.

It's not just about publishers, if you make a recording today, and sell it yourself on iTunes, and it makes money, anybody who was a part of that recording could have their hand out. Unless, you settle it before hand

Yes, I had a release form I used to have the players sign before the session. Just good business tactics. Now the singers are a completely different animal.

John

Jody , Re ; The points system,

I've only ever seen it used at the very high end, and that's for producers only. Everyone else is "staff" and has signed the appropriate work for hire release forms. The accountants take care of bonus points anyway.

Also at the very low end zero budget where where you grab a bunch of mates on a deferred payment basis.

Fdemetrio, a like that story. From the opposite angle, if you offered to pay the studio on a royalty system, they would go broke as 99.9% of all produced art makes no money. The door is over there..... they would say... with an appropriate giggle.

John, yes, vocalists are a whole different kettle of fish. I've found it usually works best as a split, as the work is mutually beneficial.

cheers, niteshift .

In most countries of the world, singer, musicians and record labels now get a royalty for airplay, as well as publishers and songwriters, except the US and several other countries. The radio stations pay those royalties by a percentage of advertising revenue. The radio stations in in the US are required to pay only writers and publishers, therefore other countries will not pay royalties to American produced music that are played in their countries, which deprives US artist, musicians and labels of millions of dollars. The main villains are the US radio stations who cheat everyone out of these royalties to fatten their bottom line.

The law makers should pass a law requiring radio stations to pay those people, not producer, mixer and engineers, they are paid well up front and don't depend on elusive airplay royalties which may never come.

Yeah Nite, a studio working on royalty only would not last long, not unless every client they had were famous artists selling lots of records

It just struck me funny, some people have everything figured out, cept for the part where you need to be good!

The first thing you should have before drawing up contracts, is the skill needed to make recordings that can generate royalties!

I also knew a guy who was a brilliant engineer and musician/producer. And he rote and recorded jingles for local businesses, and recorded a few well known artists, some older ones but big in their own rite

And it's always a flat fee, you pay him for his magic, what you do with it after is up to you. He knows you can scare people when you start talking contracts for a simple recording session, or even a big recording project....he's also probably smart enough to realize royalties will not exist.

And while 100 an hour fir his skill set and gear is cheap, it's still not practical paying that kind of money for recordings. Talking probably 2 grand a song....but u do get record quality.

One of the reasons you have seen the business go so "inside" over the past 20 years is due to the point that the revenue has shrunk in all forms of music. Everything pays less. So years ago, producers also became publishers, production companies, and even co-writers on most of the songs. In Nashville, a majority of the publishers were hit writers before they got into publishing. Sort of the same model the rap industry has done since the beginning.

The original artist becomes a star, having been brought into the business by an artist/producer that was there BEFORE them. That artist and their companies then develop their own artists, write and produce the song, many times also are partners in the record labels. Very much like the Hollywood studio system of the 30's and 40's. They own parts of everything. So they ARE writers, producers, etc. as well.

When reality television like AMERICAN IDOL and THE VOICE came on the scene, they developed the "360 Degree" deal, where they shared also in touring, merchandising, etc. And artists like Carrie Underwood, and Kelly Clarkson, most of the biggest stars of those shows, still pay money to the production companies involved.

When revenue disappears from one area, it is made up in other areas. All the more reason why writers have to become involved with artists BEFORE they are involved in deals, writing and helping those artists develop. And more of the reason getting outside songs cut are all but a thing of the past.Pays to build the relationships of tomorrow today.

MAB

Trying to explain how all this works often feels like an exercise in futility when people stick to their preconceived notions and are unwilling to learn. Don't ya think?

Well, finding up and coming artists can also be an exercise in futility.

The great ones don't need you, the good ones are a dime a dozen, and the bad ones won't help you.

Record companies spend millions, or at least used to, on trying to find talent, and only a small percentage are ever going to make a dime.

So it has to be equally hard for a songwriter to find an artist who is not a better writer than themselves, and then ride their coattails

If somebody can explain to me a way to make 50 k.a year as a singer songwriter, I'm all ears! I'll drop my other gigs

The plot thickens... if I have interpreted the message from our "resident insiders" correctly... it is okay with "The Industry" to make things even more difficult for "outsiders" to break into the inner sanctum! Someone in the Senate or House must have been convinced this proposed deal will be good for them, too. I wonder what Oren Hatch thinks about this idea? (He is a song-writer, I'm told.)

Perhaps a sense of fair play will sweep over the halls of power and all this hoop-la will be history that never happened... but I doubt it.

Orrin Hatch is retiring from the Senate - we can all rejoice!! As a candidate years ago he ran under the guise of term limits for government people like House Reps and Senators. The humor is, he became what he resisted - one of the longest running incumbents ever. How he kept getting reelected is baffling. Utah is probably going to elect that mess known as Romney next.

But what that has to do with royalties to producers, mixers and sound engineers, I have no idea.

As for him being a songwriter - its true enough that I think he's even won a grammy. Does it make him partial to songwriters? I doubt it.

I've met family related to him. Even they don't like him and wish they could disown him and his politics.

That's not a sign of a duck.
I'm the last of many, I run illogically crosswise to every one of them.
Some may have even dis-owned me, I don't know, but prolly.

Yep, in many ways it is.

I don't really understand what is so hard to understand. The "outsiders" are continually moving to the "inside" as the get to know people, and their career either advances or doesn't. This is a business of people and if you are not willing to invest the time and effort to meet the PEOPLE involved then you need to keep doing what you are doing and if that works for you fine. If it doesn't, then you have to find another way, or not.

Record companies are spending millions on people who are already establishing themselves. If you are not trying to find new people and trying to HELP them to become better, then you're missing the boat.

There's not a button you can push, a web site you can visit, or a short cut you can take. Sorry, just doesn't exist. and if you do any study of any of music history, you will see the same things we are going through now are things we have ALWAYS BEEN GOING THROUGH. People that are successful make relationships early and those relationships are what they take to a career.

Sorry, but that is life.

MAB

JPF needs to add the idea of the like buttons that other social places use. 😆

Sure, if you're going to pay the cost we can add that right away... but when we updated the entire message boards at a cost of thousands of dollars we and after a lot of effort by Bob and others we raised about 20% of the cost. So I am happy to get a quote if you're writing the check... or you could actually post a meaningful reply say you agree that might take you 30 seconds showing it really was so supported by you that you invested that amount of time to say so...

I am not so sure about this.. This can't be retroactively given to people who already signed deals and terms and were compensated based on that because that is unjust and the idea that they could determine which songs had such a deal and which didn't is bull, it could never happen. It will never happen that way. So this is double dipping plus the money will NEVER get to indie folks doing these jobs so I expect like the money held for studio musicians currently, this money will go to a tiny number of people either connected to a union or similar gatekeeper and all the indies will get screwed. There is no way this will fairly be distributed and it simply takes money from the people taking all the speculative risks, the artists and writers.

Producers, mixers and engineers get historically paid upfront whether a project goes anywhere or not. The big time names get points. None deserve more than that. This is powerful people who hired lobbyists to do a cash grab... ack... same old corruption, just a new strategy for a cash grab by the already rich and powerful. Sure, it may bypass the corrupt labels but it is just another cartel of the powerful skimming off the paltry top. Royalty money is already microscopic and this takes from that small pot of money. At least that's what it appears to me.

Exactly who is doing the skimming? Where is this idea coming from that the Bill going thru the House and Senate is about taking more money from someone? You asked me to post a summary and link in the other post. I did that.

I'm not a big name and when I produce someone, I ask for points on the recording work I do, for a lessor fee up front. A good producer should be compensated if the work goes stratospheric. I've also granted points to other producers who have worked with me for the same reason. If their work helps get me somewhere big, I also believe they should be rewarded for that. Pretty simple concept really.

The conspiracy theories are really starting to fly eh?