BMI Statements

[MichaelL]

8,704 performances of one song on Spotify $1.73

5 TV Episodes — 5 minutes of music on Hulu $.38

I can retire now! 😀

[Art Munson]

Yeah, also looking at all those “local” rates that use to pay national. Sigh…

[MichaelL]

Yeah, also looking at all those “local” rates that use to pay national. Sigh…

But on the bright side…

I sold an RF cue this morning that paid 24X what BMI just paid me for nearly a minute of THEME MUSIC on a local broadcast (of a national show). That same cue has sold many times.

I’m back to thinking of royalties as just the icing on the cake, rather than the end game!

[Art Munson]

I sold an RF cue this morning that paid 24X what BMI just paid me for nearly a minute of THEME MUSIC on a local broadcast (of a national show). That same cue has sold many times.

Same experience here. It’s just getting enough RF sales to match the BMI payouts.

[Mojo Rising]

I have still never done a RF site, as I was concerned it would be adverse to my catalog being in other libraries that get decent synch fees for placements. But this makes me want to try! I have several libraries that place my music, usually just back end income, but a few do get synch fees each time, at least a little something. Still I have not reached nearly the amount of income that I’m looking for on a regular basis. But I also gig a lot and teach to supplement.

[MichaelL]

@Mojo FWIW I view TV and RF as two different worlds. I don’t have the same music in both arenas.

TV cues and successful RF tracks really do have a differnt vibe. There is some overlap. But, there’s definitely an art to writing for each.

[daveydad]

i thought spotify paid 0.008 per stream? i average about 0.01 per play. my bmi statement wasn’t much better. no major tv shows and just a few cents here and there for lesser known channels (see below). my best and most consistent payout? pandora. and i make even more from them via soundexchange.

same cue played during primetime on discovery channel and on one of of its sub-channels. pathetic difference!

DISCOVERY
BILLY BOB S GAGS TO RICHES – UP PITCH CREEK
2 BILLY BOB S GAGS TO RICHE-CUES 100.00% $15.23 $0.00 $15.23

DESTINATION AMERICA
BILLY BOB S GAGS TO RICHES – UP PITCH CREEK
2 BILLY BOB S GAGS TO RICHE-CUES 100.00% $0.28 $0.00 $0.28

[Alex Del Zoppo]

Indeed! Your calculater is no better than mine it seems.

[JakeH]

Just got my first royalties yesterday. Got $460, placements on CBS, VH1, and MTV. I thought your first royalty check was supposed to only buy you a decent meal at a restaurant lol

[guscave]

My TV royalties have been steadily going down for the last year. I think I’ll be focusing more on writing tracks for RF libraries. Maybe splitting up the work whereby I can work on TV cue two weeks of the month and RF library tracks the other two weeks.

[JakeH]

Maybe you’re with the wrong libraries? I would imagine being with places like KT, MT, FirstCom, WCPM, etc would bring in a lot of royalties so you wouldn’t even think about doing RF.

[OverDub]

Have to agree with guscave. My check was up 10% from last quarter, but no where near enough to live off of. Been doing this for over 4 years with around 300 cues floating out there, really thought it’d be better than this by now. I had better checks the year after I started! Going to have to try a new plan. Maybe more RF is either the answer or the nail in the coffin, haven’t decided yet!

[guscave]

Maybe you’re with the wrong libraries? I would imagine being with places like KT, MT, FirstCom, WCPM, etc would bring in a lot of royalties so you wouldn’t even think about doing RF.

I’ve actually been using both for about 4 years, but as the royalties for TV stuff have been going down, those from RF have been going up. It’s just that my RF payouts have not yet reach the same numbers as my TV royalties.

Currently more than 85% of my roaylties are coming from Jingle Punks with the remaining amount from SK, Syncfree, and JF.

[MichaelL]

Maybe more RF is either the answer or the nail in the coffin, haven’t decided yet!

Two things guys:

1) BMI royalties are down across the board, because starting with the 2nd Q of 2104 they began to include television ratings into their formula. Prior to that, they paid network level rates across the board. If you have a lot of music on minor cable channels or local broadcast channel you took a major hit, which is not going to change.
Welcome to the new normal.

2) RF libraries by and large DO NOT compete with JP, SK, etc. For the most part, they have a completely different client base. AND…the kind of music that seems to do well in RF libraries often differs from your typical TV cue kind of stuff.

If you’re going to take RF seriously, I recommend that you study up on what sells.

You can:
1. Follow the “music of the moment” on Pond5.
2. Watch client videos on AudioSparx.com
3. Do a filter search on Music Loops for best sellers.

Cheers,
Michael

[Mojo Rising]

Do you think there is a danger in putting music in RF libraries that you already have in NE places like JP? If the clients are completely different than it shouldn’t matter right? Art Munson you said that you retitle the songs for RF? I can’t justify making tracks just for RF, and not sending them anywhere else.

In a related note I recently got some songs that were originally accepted with a NE library deleted from their catalog because they noticed it was also in another competing NE library. I feel like the libraries want to have their cake and eat it too. They want to compete so they want to offer exclusive material, and they want to give it away gratis or sell blanket deals and not share with the artist. The artist gets screwed making twice as much music for half as much money. This is why I”m starting to think seriously about RF but it also feels like following these trends just helps speed up the race to the bottom.

I have one company that is NE and always gets synch fees, I’m probably going to write for them only from now on. But they too are asking that I don’t spread the songs out to other libraries. but with synch fees I’m ok with that. I guess you could call that semi exclusive, because there is nothing legally stopping me from sending the same songs to other NE places, or just retitling them.

Not sure about you guys but I haven’t seen much of any benefit to going with straight EX companies. They still aren’t paying up front, or getting synch fees more often than the typical JP type place so why have your music in one place when it can be in several? The trick is just finding companies with different client bases. I will only do EX from now one if its a high end place that wants a niche type thing and can guarantee decent synch fees. The more musicians that are willing to do EX deals for potential gratis placements just hurts everybody in the end IMO.

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