Most corporate annual reports seek to paint a glowing picture of the business’s doings for the previous year. By law they have to disclose anything really unfortunate – financial losses, management malfeasance, a change in the regulatory landscape. Which can cause problems of “too much honesty” for the music business.

The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry was caught in this bind, when writing its Digital Music Report 2010 (PDF) (or see the press release).

•Paint too glowing a picture of the music business, and politicians might conclude no further legislation is needed to bolster the sector.
•Paint too gloomy a picture, and ministers might conclude that this is a lost cause, and better to let dying business models die.

So IFPI’s annual report veers between complaining about “competing in a rigged market” (by which they mean a market in which file-sharing exists) and stressing the popularity of music and the burgeoning success of legally sanctioned services.

Yay, Spotify! Yay, Sky Songs! Yay, iTunes! You would have to be the most curmudgeonly of commentators to point out that none of these are services begun by music companies; they are services begun by others that music companies have been grudgingly persuaded to make deals with.

I say grudgingly; naturally, I was not present at contract negotiations. Perhaps the vivid picture of extreme foot-dragging portrayed in Steve Levy’s The Perfect Thing is wrong; perhaps the music companies were hopping up and down like Easter bunnies in their eagerness to have their product included. If they were, I’d argue that the existence of free file-sharing drove them to it.

Without file-sharing there would very probably be no paid subscription services now; the music industry would still be selling everyone CDs and insisting that this was the consumer’s choice.

The basic numbers showed that song downloads increased by 10 percent – but total revenue including CDs fell by 12 percent in the first half of 2009. The top song download: Lady Gaga’s “Poker Face”.

All this is fair enough – an industry’s gotta eat! – and it’s just possible to read it without becoming unreasonable. And then you hit this gem:

Illegal file-sharing has also had a very significant, and sometimes disastrous, impact on investment in artists and local repertoire.
With their revenues eroded by piracy, music companies have far less to plough back into local artist development. Much has been made of the idea that growing live music revenues can compensate for the fall-off in recorded music sales, but this is, in reality, a myth. Live performance earnings are generally more to the benefit of veteran, established acts, while it is the younger developing acts, without lucrative careers, who do not have the chance to develop their reputation through recorded music sales.

So: digital music is ramping up (mostly through the efforts of non-music industry companies and investors). Investment in local acts and new musicians is down. And overall sales are down. And we’re blaming file-sharing? How about blaming at least the last year or so of declining revenues on the recession? How about blaming bean counters at record companies who see a higher profit margin in selling yet more copies of back catalogue tried-and-tested, pure-profit standards like Frank Sinatra and Elvis Presley than in taking risks on new music?

At some point, won’t everyone have all the copies of the Beatles albums they can possibly use? Er, excuse me, “consume”. (The report has a disturbing tendency to talk about “consuming” music; I don’t think people have the same relationship with music that they do with food. I’d also question IFPI’s whine about live music revenues: all young artists start by playing live gigs, that’s how they learn; radio play gets audiences in; live gigs and radio play sell albums, which help sell live gigs in a virtuous circle, but that’s a topic for another day.)

It is a truth rarely acknowledged that all new artists – and all old artists producing new work – are competing with the accumulated back catalogue of the past decades and centuries.

IFPI of course also warns that TV, book publishing, and all other media are about to suffer the same fate as music. The not-so-subtle underlying message: this is why we must implement ferocious anti-file-sharing measures in the Digital Economy Bill, amendments to which, I’m sure coincidentally, were discussed in committee this week, with more to come next Tuesday, January 26.

But this isn’t true, or not exactly. As a Dutch report on file-sharing (original in Dutch) pointed out last year, file-sharing, which it noted goes hand-in-hand with buying, does not have the same impact on all sectors. People listen to music over and over again; they watch TV shows fewer but still multiple times; if they don’t reread books they do at least often refer back to them; they see most movies only once.

If you want to say that file-sharing displaces sales, which is debatable, then clearly music is the least under threat. If you want to say that file-sharing displaces traditional radio listening, well, I’m with you there. But IFPI does not make that argument.

Still, some progress has been made. Look what IFPI says here, on page 4 in the executive summary right up front: “Recent innovations in the à-la-carte sector include… the rollout of DRM-free downloads internationally.”

Wha-hey! That’s what we told them people wanted five years ago. Maybe five years from now they’ll be writing how file-sharing helps promote artists who, otherwise, would never find an audience because no one would ever hear their work

In its latest number crunching, international music body IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) reports that global digital music revenues reached $4.2 billion, a 12 percent increase in 2009.

The IFPI also reports that more than a quarter of all recorded music revenues came from digital channels and that sales of single track downloads increased by an estimated 10 percent while digital album sales rose approximately 20 percent.

However, total revenue, including CD sales, dropped 12 percent in the first half of 2009, continuing a downward trend that has seen sales drop by 30 percent since 2004.

While the report mentions that there are more legitimate channels for music distribution than ever before, piracy continues to be the recording industry’s worst nightmare. The IFPI estimates illicit downloads make up approximately 95 percent of all music downloaded worldwide.

The IFPI report also spotlights three countries known for their music – France, Spain and Brazil – showing that piracy has damaged each country’s recorded music industry.

According to the organization, Spain, which has the highest number of illegal downloaders, saw sales by local artists in the top 50 fall by about 65 percent between 2004 and 2009. Meanwhile, France experienced a 60 percent decline in local releases.

Brazil’s recording industry also took a major hit as full-priced, major label, local album releases from the five largest music companies dropped 80 percent in 2008 from their 2005 level.

Along with issuing its report, the IFPI praised efforts to increase digital distribution channels and licensing deals with services such as Spotify and MySpace Music, as well as agreements with Internet service providers including Denmark’s TDC and U.K.’s Sky.

But the report also says current ISP licensing deals are not enough and that more ISPs must take an active stance in keeping illicit downloads from traversing their networks.

The organization also cited countries that have passed legislation designed to curb illegal file-sharing, such as “three strike” laws calling for repeat offenders to be disconnected from the ‘Net. In addition to bemoaning music piracy, the IFPI made it clear that it’s not only recording companies that are suffering, but also other entertainment industries, such as film and television.

“In 2009 the mood has crucially changed,” IFPI president / CEO John Kennedy said.

“It is now accepted that this is about the future of a broad base of creative industries that have huge economic importance and employ vast numbers of people. Governments, led by France, South Korea, Taiwan, the U.K. and New Zealand led the way in 2009 by adopting or proposing legislation to tackle piracy. It is vital these efforts are seen through to their conclusion and followed by other governments in 2010.”

However, this does not necessarily mean that certain artists were not successful. The death of the “King of Pop,” Michael Jackson, in July helped him to become the top selling artist of the year. Similarly, artists like Taylor Swift and The Beatles also had top selling albums even though they did not release anything new in the past year. Swift’s 2008 album, Fearless, was the top-selling album of the year, followed by Britain’s Got Talent sensation Susan Boyle, whose album was titled I Dreamed a Dream.

Music reps attribute this decline in album sales to the increased volume of internet music piracy and also the increased popularity of using sites such as iTunes instead of buying the album. In addition, it seems as though the general population has focused its attention more on movies and live music events rather than on album music in the past year. The failure of music stores like the Virgin Megastore and Circuit City have not helped matters, either.

The losses are attributed to lack of awareness about intellectual property rights and the means to monetise original work.

Veteran music composer Ilaiyaraaja has now woken up to address the issue of copyrights protection. He announced his licensing agreement with Malaysia-based music label Agi Music on Tuesday. The company will henceforth hold rights of all of the music director’s compositions done before the year 2000.

“Movie producers and co­mposers are advised not to use my songs and background scores (includ­ing re­mixes) before 2000, without prior permission and licensing,” the music composer said.

“It is also mandatory for advertisement agencies, TV channels and TV serial producers to take proper license and permission from Agi Music to use my songs in their productions or programmes.

Agi music has the rights to administrate all of my work before 2000, in all areas and platforms including broadcasting. Contrary to Indian practice, these rights do not belong to film producers and consequently no producer has the authority or right to distribute them,” he added.

The legendary music director has over 6,000 compositions in most of the major Indian languages to his credit. Post 2000, he sold the rights of almost all of his songs to film producers.

While the film industry is still battling the problem of protecting copyrights in the traditional media such as TV and radio, new media formats including ringtones, downloads and pen-drive copying have added to its woes.

Agi Music has tied up with Unisys Infosolutions to tackle this challenge and keep track of the company’s content in India. However, officials refused to divulge the financial details of the agreement between the two companies and Ilaiyaraaja .

Sumeet Singh, executive director of Unisys, said that the mobile value-added services provider would enter into agreements with offline stores and online portals to convince them to pay for original content. This method will help to protect copyrights as well as save the businesses of small vendors, he added.

Vendors will have to pay a nominal annual fee to get access to original content from Unisys’ library comprising over three lakh tracks in 41 languages, he said. Over 50,000 such vendors exist in north India alone, Singh added. But, the question still remains — who would ever come forward to pay for content in the name of fair and ethical business practice, especially in the absence of stringent regulations?

Exclusivity

Your booking agent will be looking for an exclusive arrangement. They won’t want to be competing for your work with other agents. Your arrangement with your booking agency  sits alongside your management agreement. Indeed your manager may be very involved in the appointment of the booking agent. Your management contract will usually give you the right to approve the identity of any booking agent that your manager appoints on your behalf. Your manager looks after all other aspects of touring other that the actual booking of the concerts. There is a danger of an overlap in the comission arrangements. You don’t want to be paying a booking agent and your manager out of gross income. The management contract will usually say that the manager takes his comission after any comission to a booking agent has been deducted. The management contract will usually give you approval over the term son which your agent is appointed if they want to charge more that the industry norm of 15-20%. Your booking agent’s fee should be deducted from the gross income first and manager’s comission should be calculated on the net amount that is left after the agency comission and any other deductions agreed in the management contract.

The best way to check if someone else is already using the name is to google it or to go to a beg record store like HMV to check if their catalogue for the name. If both these searches don’t bring any similar names, then you are halfway there. It is still possible to have registered a name without publishing any music or releasing a single or a record as yet.

You can also apply to register or search for the band with the Band Register. The Band Register is a commercial operation and many record companies, A&R Managers and lawyers subscribe to it as a means of searching for band names on behalf of their clients.

2nd quarter saw 17 Top 100 charting hits from Pink (“Sober”) to Flo Rida (“Right Round”), Kings of Leon (“Sex of Fire” and “Use Somebody”) to Theory of a Deadman (“Not Meant to Be”), Brad Paisley (“Then”) to the Zac Brown Band (“Toes”), including the rare occurrence of the same song “No Boundaries” by two different artists, the American Idols Adam Lambert and Kris Allen. Recent deals have included the Guild Music and Murrah catalog acquisitions, publishing agreements with Grammy winning producers Tim and Bob and The Veils, as well as the first record release on Bug Music Records, The Features “Some Kind of Salvation,” part of the joint venture record label with the band Kings of Leon (global #1 charting album).

“What an amazing quarter for our writers, who are the best around,” said John Rudolph, CEO of Bug Music. “It was across the board – new writers like Bruno Mars having a #1, Kara DioGuardi having multiple songs in the top 100, Ashley Gorley scoring several #1s in country music, and the Kings of Leon becoming the international kings of rock. It is encouraging in these uncertain times in that our writers are the fuel behind the hits.”

Leading music industry publication Billboard recently released their Q2 publishers rankings and share analysis. Bug Music ranks #6 among Billboard’s Top 10 Publisher Airplay chart holding 4.2% of the U.S. radio airplay chart share, an increase of nearly 70% over Q1. This finding marks the company’s fifth consecutive quarterly market share gain, beginning at the first quarter of 2008. Additionally, Bug Music’s share is up 280% over the same period one year ago. During Q2, the company held shares in more than 10% of the songs in the top 100. In the U.K., Music Week ranked Bug Music #5 in Album share and #6 in Combined Single and Album share for Q2 publishers.

About Bug Music:

Boasting over 250,000 copyrights including the classics “What a Wonderful World,” “Fever” and “Happy Together,” as well as hit songs from such musical luminaries as Johnny Cash, Pete Townshend, Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, Woody Guthrie, Townes Van Zandt and Stevie Ray Vaughan to contemporary hit makers Three Six Mafia, Ashley Gorley (Carrie Underwood, Trace Atkins), Kara DioGuardi (Pink, Jonas Brothers, Celine Dion), Iggy Pop, Bruno Mars, Ryan Adams, Kings of Leon and Wilco, Bug Music’s reputation, across its eight offices in the US and Europe, as a writer/artist-oriented music company and trusted counsel of legendary estates and current artists is unrivaled. www.bugmusic.com

Attorneys for Katherine Jackson withdrew their objections to an agreement with merchandiser Bravado to bring everything from Jackson trading cards, apparel and cell phone themes to consumers.

But her objections remain a roadblock to a deal that would put some of her son’s prized items on display later this year.

That tour was intended to coincide with the release of a major movie featuring his final rehearsals for a series of London shows.

Burt Levitch, an attorney for Jackson’s mother, Katherine, said her objections were over concerns about her son’s legacy, as well as the split of proceeds from the memorabilia tour with concert promoter AEG Live.

Attorneys for AEG and the current administrators of Jackson’s estate wanted the memorabilia tour approved on Monday, but Superior Court Judge Mitchell Beckloff instead scheduled an evidentiary hearing to determine if the deal represented the best arrangement for Jackson’s estate.

Katherine Jackson and her three grandchildren are set to receive the vast majority of estate of the King of Pop who died on June 25.

An attorney appointed to represent the children’s interests said Monday she thought the deal should be approved.

Kathy Jorrie, an attorney for AEG, said the memorabilia exhibition faces a tight deadline and the company’s interest might wane if the tour is not approved soon.

She said the company was not interested in renegotiating the deal.

AEG wants the memorabilia tour to open at the same time as a movie using footage of Jackson’s final rehearsals.

The deal is expected to generate up to $6 million for the estate, said Howard Weitzman, an attorney for the current administrators of the estate.

Columbia Pictures paid $60 million for the rights to the film based on the Jackson footage, and Jackson’s estate is slated to receive 90 percent of the film’s profits.

One of the concessions Katherine Jackson is apparently seeking is the authority to sign off on the deal. Beckloff said he was inclined to reject that argument.

“She doesn’t own the property,” Beckloff said.

“There’s no reason to make her a signatory to those agreements.”

But Beckloff said he was not sure that he could grant the estate’s administrators approval to enter into the deal without hearing more information.

The judge said he was in a difficult position and was concerned that delays in approving the deal – which was first proposed nearly two weeks ago – are hurting the estate.

“I see the delay as a real problem for the estate,” Beckloff said. – AP

BA Honours, 3 year full-time

To be a leader in providing education and training in innovative music creation and business practice. The BA(Hons) Commercial Music programme to be the world leader in music industry education and to be at the centre of a globally extended network of music industry organisations.

This course covers music production, music business and the study of music as culture. The first of its kind in the UK, it operates in the heart of the London’s music industry, offering musicians and aspiring music business professionals the chance to learn, practise and experiment. It has strong links with major record labels, as well as a wide range of independent music and multimedia companies. Graduates continue to make a significant impact in all sectors of the business. The course has educational links to Rock Academie, Tilburg, Netherlands, Pop Akademie, Mannheim, Germany and ICOM, Malaysia.

The course has three main areas of study: music production, music business and music sociology. Students may specialise in either music production or music business (including music business law), or choose a mixture of both.

Music production: covers live and recorded production, songwriting, composition, arranging, performance, music technology, film and multi-media production. Culminates in the third year with an individual, large-scale production-based project.

Music business:covers music industry structure and sector roles, copyright and music business law; strategies in the music business; repertoire management; international markets and entrepreneurship. Students have a wide choice of work experience opportunities within the industry as well as marketing product generated by the music production students. Culminates in a music business major project covering a range of options from working with established businesses to company start-ups.

Music sociology: covers the cultural and social roles of commercial music with a focus on how music has developed as a force in popular culture and the mass media. Includes an active research project in music ethnography. Culminates in the third year with an extended thesis in which students research and investigate an historical and/or critical subject related to music.