Jargon buster: Music business glossary
No idea what all this means? Some words you’ll find music business types use all the time – learn what they mean and sound really intelligent at your first job interview!
By Chris Cooke
A&R
The department or person in a record label that liaises with artists on a day to day basis. The A&R (or Artist & Repertoire) department also find and sign new bands. When artists do not write their own songs they will also look for songs for them to record by looking at a ‘repertoire’ of tracks – ie they link artists to repertoire. This was once a key role of the A&R person, hence their name.
—
ADVANCE
The sum of money paid to an artist in cash when they sign to a record label or music publisher. The advance is just part of the investment made by the label – they will also commit to spend agreed sums on recording, manufacturing, distributing and marketing a certain number of albums. Labels get the ‘advance’ back from record sales, should there be any!
—
AGENT (OR BOOKING AGENT)
The person or company who books gigs and festival appearances for an artist. A good agent will try to persuade promoters of tours and festivals to book their artists, though for more established acts the booking agent is normally fielding queries from promoters trying to make a booking.
—
COLLECTING SOCIETY
An organisation that collects royalties on behalf of a number of record labels or music publishers, and their artists and songwriters. A collecting society will only collect royalties from certain kinds of organisations, normally TV and radio stations or other music companies. Labels and publishers, or their representatives, will work directly with other companies looking to use their music. The main collecting societies in the UK are PPL (for record labels) and MCPS-PRS (for publishers).
—
DISTRIBUTION COMPANY
A company that gets CDs from a record label to a record shop. Distribution companies often also take on a marketing role on behalf of the labels they work for – ie persuading record shops to stock their CDs. Digital distribution companies make sure tracks are available in all the various formats (WMA, MP3, AAC) and liaise with download stores.
—
INDEPENDENT LABEL
Any record label or record company other than EMI, SonyBMG, Warner and Universal, and any label in which one of these four firms has less than a 51% stake.
—
IP RIGHTS
Other than the sale of tickets to live perfomances, much of the money in the music business is made through the ownership of ‘intellectual property rights’, mainly copyright and trademarks. This means artists and music companies need to understand intellectual property law – most don’t, which is why they have to hire music lawyers.
—
MAJOR LABEL
The major record companies are EMI, SonyBMG, Warner and Universal Music, and major labels are those owned by these four firms – eg Parlophone, RCA, Atlantic and Island.
—
MANAGER (OR ARTIST MANAGER)
The one person (or company) that is involved in every aspect of an artist’s career, and the person who will normally negotiate an artist’s deals with their label, publisher, promoter, agent etc
—
PLUGGER
A music PR person who deals exclusively with broadcast media – radio and TV – and whose primary job is persuading DJs, producers and heads of music to play or playlist their music. A plugger may work for a record label, or an agency hired by the record label.
—
PROMOTER
A person or company who produces and bankrolls live music events such as gigs, tours and festivals.
—
PUBLISHER
In music, publishing isn’t about magazines or newspapers, but about songs. Whereas record labels work with recording artists, publishers work with songwriters and composers. A singer songwriter will be signed to both a label and a publisher. They are called publishers because in the past a key part of their business was publishing sheet music of songs written by songwriters and composers signed to them.
—
RECORD LABEL
Companies who release recorded music – ie CDs and downloads. They sign artists to recording deals whereby the artist agrees to exclusively release their music via the label in return for a cash advance and a commitment to spend a certain amount of money making and marketing their recordings. The label recovers that money through record sales and royalty payments. Profits made after the investment is recovered (or recouped) is split between the label and the artist.
—
RECOUP
When a record label or publisher makes an investment in an artist, they will often take all monies that artist’s music generates until the investment is paid off. When that happens the artist is said to have ‘recouped’. After that point future revenues will be split between the label/publisher and the artist.
—
ROSTER
The list of bands a music company works with. Many artist deals are exclusive, so they can only be on one label or publisher or agent’s roster at any one time. Though you may see established artists appear on a number of competing companies’ rosters, because some record labels and publishers will include artists they used to work with on their roster too – because they still have a stake in recordings or songs those artists made during those past relationships.
—
ROYALTY
The money you have to pay a record company or publisher if you want to ‘use’ one of their recordings or songs. The situations when a royalty has to be paid are governed by copyright law – but are wide-ranging. Common royalty payments include the money a record label pays a publisher when it releases recordings of one of their songs, and the money radio stations pay to the labels and publishers in return for playing their songs on air.
—
SCOUTING
Searching for new artists. The A&R department in a record label has A&R scouts who listen to demos and attend gigs staged by new bands (and increasingly spend a lot of time checking out new bands on MySpace!) to see if they might be acts they want to sign. Other music firms will also scout new talent to work with.
—
SYNC RIGHTS
The right to use a song in a TV programme, film, video game or advert. Record labels are making increasing amounts of money by giving TV, film and advertising companies sync rights, and now have people or agencies specifically looking to sell these rights.
This article is part of the unicornjobs.com guide to Working In The Music Business. Click here to go to the guide index.
