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Another couple of useful tidbits I’ve picked up along the way: ‘write when you don’t have to’, and ‘write something every day’.
I picked that on up from you Mark. Great advice!!!
Cheers,
Michael
OK guys..time out.
There are several levels of “libraries” in this industry. That is not a bad thing. They serve different markets and different clientele.
Anon is correct…to a degree. If you are ranking ALL libraries, then libraries like Extreme, Killer, KPM are the cream of the crop. But, lumping ALL libraries together is not how this business works. Top tier libraries are proactive in representing their catalog (because they own it). Royalty free libraries provide a place for YOU to sell your music.
Everybody’s favorite word is placement. By that, most writers mean that their music get’s placed in a television show. Top tier libraries have sales reps that actually work to place tracks. They do pay composers upfront, as much as $1,000 per track. Sounds great…right? It’s certainly a viable way to make a lot of money for a small percentage of composers. And, yes, you are competing with the likes of Hans Zimmer, etc. Those libraries are hard to get into because that pay of front AND have top talent to choose from.
There are tons of smaller exclusive libraries that pay anywhere from $150 to $400 per cue, up front. I have a lot a music in libraries at this level, with mixed success on the backend. At that price point, without significant backend, it’s worth it, in my opinion, to consider putting your tracks into royalty free (RF) libraries.
WHY….there are hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of customers who buy music for things other than feature films and TV shows…like documentary films, corporate productions, corporate meetings, local advertising, youtube videos, etc. The vast majority of non-broadcast producers are not going to use libraries, like Extreme, because they are too expensive, AND they may not have the kind of music the non-broadcast users prefer. There is a difference. (but that’s another story)
SO…if you don’t lump all libraries under one umbrella (because they are apples and oranges) and you correctly consider the royalty free world as an entity unto itself, then libraries, like AudioSparx, MusicLoops, Shockwave, and Pond5 are at the top of their level.
In summary: The libraries, mentioned by Anon, are indeed top tier, but they are a completely different business model than the royalty free libraries that Del mentioned. The RF libraries that I mentioned (and others) are great RF libraries. But you shouldn’t put music into them with the same goals or expectations that you have for top exclusive libraries, like Extreme (or even Jingle Punks and Crucial etc., which are still a different business model). High end theatrical advertising (trailer) producers are not shopping RF libraries for the soundtrack track to their next blockbuster promo.
As far as income goes, although it is possible to make $100,000 per year from top tier libraries, that will only happen to a very few fortunate composers, because only a relative few composers “get in.” And not everyone in one of those libraries makes that much money.
That said, if you’ve read MLR for a few years, you know that last year Erwin (50 styles) made about 20K with around 100 tracks from AudioSparx alone. “Dan” stated in one of Art’s composer interviews that he was making 100K from royalty free libraries. And, based upon conversations that I’ve had with some RF library owners, it is possible to make a fair amount of money, if you have a lot of tracks (1,000+)
You’re all correct, to a degree, but the library business is not a uniform, monolithic entity. Don’t fight over apples and oranges.
Cheers,
Michael
The point to take away from Jay’s story about the pitch pipe is that doing something other than using the same old loops, samples and synths gets attention, because it’s creative.
Kudos Jay!
I use an outdated half broken laptop and a pair of $20 headphones. Have a few bits of software. I currently make about $70k a year in placements. Hopefully this post won’t jinx that..
LOL. That’s great. Where can I get a pair of those headphones? 🙂
>A few things will heppan if PRO are gonna start using tunesat:
1) The PRO’s not gonna have enough money to pay and royalties will be much lower. They will try to get more from the networks and I think only the big ones will up the fee and the small ones will stay the same, so even lower cable royalties. yay!<
The PROs will have plenty of money. ASCAP does not collect less money just because it misses a large percentage of performances.
2) False positives as Anonymous said. Too much similar loops from royalty free sample libraries are at use those days, so a lot of the same detections will appear on multiple composers account for something they didn’t wrote. Again, more money to pay.
It happens, but it takes very little to have music with a different fingerprint. For instance, change the key, layer on different instruments. Just write something.
3) No more Non-Exclusive libraries. The model is going to die and I don’t see any solution to it. Maybe they can do something with future music that can maybe be water marked but what with the other music circling around? If the non exclusive mode will die they will have hard time to sign songs from indie bands and acts, not to mention cable channels and budgets.
I’m going to make a fine distinction. Retitling is likely to go away. But non-exlusive, if it’s under a business model like Musicsupervisor (where the artist keeps the publishing) will not.
During the process of switching from ASCAP to BMI, I had the chance to speak with upper level people at each. Both PRO’s agree, that retitling will eventually die. Both PRO’s have their own detection technology in development. As such, Tunesat will most likely remain a way for composers to monitor their performances.
“I thought ascap census vs survey data applied to commercial and promo’s and not regular programming.
http://www.ascap.com/members/payment/cablesurveys.aspx
Did I get that wrong?”
@greg, I was just about to answer that last night when the power went out.Yes…you got that wrong. ASCAP only does census, or complete surveys when they consider it “economically sensible.” http://www.ascap.com/members/payment/keepingtrack.aspx
That applies to everything, broadcast TV, cable and radio. Notice that the more money a licensee pays the more often the licensee gets sampled. In the 90’s I had contemporary jazz CD that charted at #45 nationally. BUT..it only made about $100 in royalties because most of the airplay was on college stations that pay low license fees, and are therefore surveyed less frequently. I’ve actually made far more money from Soundexchange for digital plays of the same music.
The same goes for most TV that’s not major network. Once you get away from national broadcasts on ABC, CBS, NBC or FOX. Syndicated programming on local affiliates is in survey land.
You’ll notice that for ads and promos, ASCAP uses Comptitrack, a company that monitors advertising on some, not all, cable networks. For TV, ASCAP uses Tribune Media, http://www.tribunemediaservices.com/products-and-services/television/
Tribune doesn’t monitor performances, like Tunesat, and tell you what actually aired. They keep a database of TV schedules. So, in other words, a good portion of ASCAP’s “survey” is based upon what TV schedules say is supposed to air, not necessarily what actually aired. Problem arise, when cue sheets and air-date info provided by the producer don’t match, because the survey rules, even if it’s inaccurate.
Cheers,
Michael
NOTE: If most of your music is placed on Network shows, or top tier cable, ASCAP and BMI are competitive. My experience is based on syndicated television, where BMI seems to have a better method of detecting performances.
Hey Jay,
I just answered a pm on this subject. If you haven’t been at this too long, and don’t have a lot of tracks, it isn’t that hard to switch. It’s a matter of determining your affiliation date and filling out a form. What you’ve already got out there can stay in place. You can just go forward with BMI. It gets complicated when you want to remove works.
Gotta unplug and move things out of harms way. Sandy approaches.
All the best,
Michael
Hi musiccomposer,
I’ve been very fortunate to have the opportunity to compose the theme music for a number of syndicated and cable shows. That’s where those performances come from. The music runs the gamut including, rock, world, pop/rock w/country twang, and orchestral.
I write in many genres, because that’s what interests me. However, when libraries hire me they generally ask for orchestral cues. (bang for the buck I guess).
Cheers,
Michael
FWIW…it’s not as much as it sounds. Some performances are only $.10 and by the time the pie gets sliced up, even with 3,900 performances per week, it isn’t the kind of money one would fantasize about. So, I’m still focusing on producing my library catalog,
Hi Jay,
Whether or not it is easy to switch from ASCAP to BMI depends on the individual situation. I switched as a writer and I moved my publishing from my ASCAP publishing company to my BMI publishing company. That complicated things.
For each, there is a three month window of opportunity in which you can notify ASCAP of your intent to resign your membership. The window of opportunity is based upon the date that you first became affiliated. Then, it becomes effective 6 months later. In my case, my writer window and publisher window did not line up, and I essentially bled money for three quarters.
I’m not going to make any conjecture regarding why things are the way they are. Mark Northam, from the Film Music Network, has written a lot on that subject.
In some situations, I determined that ASCAP pays perhaps as much as 40% less per minute. That’s not a secret. If you read how each calculates royalties, there are situations in which BMI pays $1.00 per minute and ASCAP pays $.60. The biggest problem for me was that most of my music airs in syndication, outside of prime time. ASCAP’s survey method missed 75-80% of my performances.
If you switch, all of your music that has another “member in interest,” like a publisher, will remain with ASCAP, unless that publisher agrees to move those works to it’s BMI entity. AND, if they do, that publisher has a three month window of opportunity, based upon its date of affiliation in which to notify ASCAP that it wishes to remove your works. And that will become effective 6 months later. The whole process could take a few years before you realize any change.
I switched for the following reasons:
1) the number of annual performances involved, and
2) where the majority of those performances occur (syndication and cable).
Your results may vary.
Best of luck,
Michael
This article is consistent with my experience with ASCAP. I have had thousands of performances, (about 3,900 per week) of which ASCAP only picked up hundreds in its surveys.
My co-publisher, with identical shares in BMI, received 8 or 9 times more in royalties than I did. Only minor adjustments were made when ASCAP was presented repeatedly with cue sheets and air date info, by the producer. I am now a member of BMI.
“I suppose I should be opened minded, but I just can’t see the other side, the point of view that says it’s ok for their work to be used for free.”
As I alluded to in a previous post: when you take the attitude that “something is better than nothing,” no matter how little, or in your view, unfair, the battle is lost.
“I am not concerned about the Scripps deal. A giveaway here and there isn’t really going to hurt my income too much.”
It already has, because you haven’t gotten paid for your work. That IS less income than you should have had.
I’m not trashing JP, but rather, like Michael Nicholas, question why some writers don’t care that they are losing income to freebies. There is no benefit to you whatsoever. Where is the trade-off?….the up-side?
@Michael Nicholas I think that Sean answered your question.
“JP has gotten me ‘started’ so to speak and they are the only reason I have a statement in ASCAP at all. It’s not a lot but more than nothing.”
THAT is one sentence worth a thousand words.
This article from Sound on Sound applies equally to writing for libraries.
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/may12/articles/notes-0512.htm
“Michael L as in Michael Laskow owner of Taxi.”
If you are trying to imply that MichaelL, on MLR, is Michael Laskow of Taxi you are so far off base as to be laughable.”
Thanks Art. Yeah…ROTFLMAO!!!!!!!
NO I AM NOT Michael Laskow. This kind of thinking is a prime example of why some people do not do well in this business. They make too many assumptions and/ or conjectures about how things get done, and who is involved, etc.
Sorry big Rome..two different guys …..3,000 miles apart. The closest I’ve come to Taxi, is riding in one!
MichaelL (NOT LASKOW)