Tune Stack

Understand Music Publishing

Ten chapters, in this order, for songwriters and indie artists. They start with the song and the master, then shares, rights, copyright, licenses, and royalties, then PROs and The MLC, and they end with the practical steps and the contracts. Facts were checked against official sources. Where a number is not on those pages, it is not on these pages either.

  1. Song vs. master

    A release can hold two copyrights. The song is the musical work. The master is the sound recording. They are commonly owned and licensed apart from each other.

  2. Writer share vs. publisher share

    The copyright starts with the writers. A publisher share is a collecting slot at a PRO, not a second song. ASCAP’s performance math is not how The MLC pays.

  3. The five rights

    For a musical composition, the Copyright Office’s chart lists five exclusive rights. A sound recording does not receive the same five.

  4. Copyright

    In the United States, copyright starts when a human author fixes an original work. A title is not protected. Registration is a later filing, not the moment the right appears.

  5. Licenses

    A license is permission to use a right you do not own. Mechanical, performance, sync, and print are not substitutes for one another, and a PRO blanket is not a sync license.

  6. Royalties

    There is no single check. Performance, mechanicals, the master, and sync arrive from different places, on different calendars, and only if the right party was registered.

  7. PROs

    ASCAP, BMI, SESAC, GMR, AllTrack, and the society in your home country collect public performance royalties for the composition. They are not the whole royalty picture.

  8. The MLC and mechanicals

    A mechanical royalty is paid for reproducing and distributing a composition. In the U.S., interactive streams and downloads under the blanket license are The MLC’s job. Joining a PRO does not do this for you.

  9. Practical steps

    Agree the split in writing, register the shares you still control, and keep one list of names and identifiers. The steps are paperwork. They are not a promise about when a check arrives.

  10. Contracts

    An administrator registers the song and collects publishing income for a fee. That is not the same thing as selling a share of the copyright, and a software subscription is a different contract again.

Publishing Power: The Ultimate Guide to Owning Your Songs and Getting Paid

The chapters are already on this site. Sign up and we’ll email you the ebook when it’s released. No date yet.