Which Royalties can I receive if I sell my work at Songbay?

If your work is sold at Songbay, it's highly likely that you will be eligible to receive royalties. When a copyrighted song or lyric is performed in public, played on the radio, sold as a CD or digital recording, or downloaded as a digital audio recording, the writer of the song (as well as the lyricist, recording artist, producer, etc.) earns a royalty, or payment. These royalties can be divided into four groups: 1. Performance Royalties 2. Mechanical Royalties 3. Printed-edition royalties 4. Synchronization Performance and mechanical royalties are generally the two main sources of income for songwriters. Performance Royalties Any type of establishment where songs are can be heard, either recorded versions or live performances, are classified as 'broadcasters'. Broadcasters can be: radio stations, TV networks, nightclubs, concert halls, stadiums, auditoriums, cinemas, companies (basically any establishment or business providing live or pre-recorded music). Broadcasters must be members of a performing rights organization and pay for the right to use music in their venues. This fee is known as a music license. The money collected from these licenses forms a fund from which royalties are calculated and distributed to songwriters and lyricists. How are Performance Royalties calculated? By law, broadcasters must keep accurate logs of the songs they broadcast or allow to be performed in their establishments, on a quarterly basis. They give this log to a performing rights organization, e.g., BMI, SESAC and ASCAP, PPRS, who then total up the amount of times a song has been performed or broadcast. They then disperse the appropriate amount of funds to the songwriters/lyricists who they represent, via royalty checks. Performing rights organizations exist to ensure that songwriters, lyricists and artists are paid each time their songs are used in a public place, broadcast on television, radio, film screen or streamed on the internet. Mechanical Royalties These are generated from payments by record companies to artists via mechanical collection agencies, such as 'The Mechanical Copyright Alliance', 'Phonographic Performance Ltd', etc. As a songwriter/publisher, you are owed a royalty every time your composition is reproduced (on vinyl, tape, CD, MP3, etc). In the United States, this royalty is generally equal to 9.1 cents per reproduced 'copy' of that song, regardless of whether those albums or singles are sold. For on-demand streams through services like Spotify and Grooveshark, the mechanical royalty rate is far lower. Examples If someone covers one of your songs and they manufacture 1000 CDs, they owe you $91, regardless of whether those CDs ever get purchased by customers. If they sell 100 MP3s of your song, they owe you $9.10. Mechanical royalties are set aside by the retailer (music stores, websites, book stores, gift stores, souvenir stands, etc), and paid to collection societies who then distribute those royalties to songwriters and publishers, in much the same way that performance rights organizations distribute funds. Synchronization Synchronization occurs whenever a song or lyric is used in combination with a movie, video, TV program, or soundtrack. In these cases, the synchronization rights are obtained by the movie, TV or video producer for a fee. This is paid to the songwriter or publisher and depends on how much of the song is used, how often it is repeated and whether the soundtrack is sold locally, nationally or Internationally. Printed Edition Royalties These royalties are generated whenever a printed version of a song or lyric is sold. Such as: sheet music, songbooks, anthologies and any other published collections of printed arrangements. To summarize, the four main sources of royalty payments for songwriters and lyricists are: 1. Performance Royalties 2. Mechanical Royalties 3. Printed-edition royalties 4. Synchronization Essentially, that's how songwriters earn money and get paid in the music industry. Unlike other companies, Songbay takes no percentage cuts of any of these royalties or fees.