Are you a songwriter or a starting music publisher looking for ways on how to organize your music efficiently? Bear in mind that organizing properly your music is highly important if you want to become a successful songwriter and a music publisher.
This is particularly helpful if you have a lot of original songs under your catalog. The truth is that you can organize your music using the available and free tools in your Windows computer. You do not need to buy some expensive music catalog software just to get your work organized. OK let’s get started… If you need to organize your music, it is highly important that it contains the following information:
First phase
1.) The official song title, this is also known as the work title.
2.) Last date updated- when was the last time you have updated any information pertaining to that song.
3.) Does the songwriting process completed?
4.) Does it have a complete broadcast quality recorded version?
5.) Does the mixing process completed?
6.) Does mastering process already done?
7.) What is the version of the recording? Is it a multi-track, live or an acoustic version?
Below is the sample screenshot how you will organize the above information using an Excel spreadsheet:
how to organize music catalog 1
The above table clearly tracks your progress; for example it says that you still have some work to do on the red items and the following songs have this following recorded versions, etc.
Second phase
This phase is just the continuation of columns in the Excel spreadsheet which is not shown in the previous screenshot. The following are the information you need to organize:
8.) Does the sound recording work have been registered to the copyright office? If yes, what is the copyright registration number? This is optional if you are the owner of the sound recording copyright, otherwise put N/A.
9.) Does the song (lyrics and music) been registered to the copyright office?
10.) Does the work been registered to a performance right society like ASCAP?
11.) Does the work been officially published for licensing? If yes, where?
12.) What is the estimated song rating? This is important in knowing the quality songs in your catalog. This may change from time to time as you have more information pertaining to the popularity of that song (from customer feedbacks, download data, etc). Below is the screenshot of the Excel spreadsheet for the second phase:
music catalog 2