In film making, variety of elements are needed, the screenplay, actors/actresses, crew and the most important- the music. Big film makers with lots of budget can afford to pay high licensing fees to use popular music/songs. These production companies can have their own dedicated licensing departments to arrange agreements with music publishers.
It can be a different scenario for independent film makers or small movie production companies. It is because they do not have its own lawyers or experts in music licensing working for them all the time. It is essential for them to know the music rights for film. Knowing these rights can be helpful for them to get permission to use copyrighted music on their film project.
If you are an independent movie/film producer that wants to legally music in your project; then make sure you know the rights that you need to be cleared before you can start working in your project.
What are the important music rights for film?
1. Right to synchronization – these are popularly called “sync” rights. These are the rights for music to be used and synchronized together with film visual images. In layman’s term; this is synonymous with the film “sound track”. The licensing fee for sync depends on the music publisher and the licensee budget.
It can be as low as $5 to as high as thousands of dollars for popular hit songs.
Film camera
For more information about licensing fees/cost, you can read the following posts:
Typical music licensing fees and cost for different projects
2. Right to use the sound recording/master recording rights – these are called “master recording rights”, the owner is typically the recording producer. Some independent music publishers are also recording producers and they also hold the rights of the sound recording.
For most of the time, the owner is the recording label; the one that finances the recording project. Another good example is the indie artist/producer that both write and produces the song. The artists wrote the song and then using his/her home studio, the master recording of that song was created. To make sure the artist original work would be protected; the artist obtains both the copyright of the song and the master recording.
The indie artist can then license this work to any interested parties such as movie/film and TV producers. Take note that in a situation like this, the artist functions both as a music publisher and a master recording rights owner.
If you plan to use the song but decides to create your own master recording for the use in the projects; then you do not need to acquire sound recording rights. You simply need to ask permission from the music publisher to cover the song. Once granted; you start making your own master recording of that song and use it in your film.
The licensing fee depends on the music publisher and the budget of the film producer. It can be as low as $5 to as high as thousands of dollars for very popular songs.
Normally in a film production where music needs to be synchronized with the film visual images, then the sync and use of master recording rights are only required (which 95% of the indie film producers should need to be cleared). But these are not the only rights which you might need to acquire for your film project.
You can read more about this topic on understanding the sound recording copyright.
3. Mechanical rights – after completing your film project. You might need to burn it to several copies of DVD which you might sell to movie shops or even distribute it to other people. The reproduction of recorded medium (DVD, film strips, CDs, video cassette) requires you to acquire mechanical rights from the music publisher of the song/ music. If you do not plan to distribute your work along with the licensed music then you do not need to acquire these rights.
In most cases (such as in Hollywood film projects), they are released and distributed to several copies (DVDS, VCD, film strips), so they should need to acquire mechanical rights. Bear in mind that independent film makers do not distribute their movies to the public. They are provided to movie distributors. Thus the film makers are not the one to obtain mechanical rights but only the distributors. The distributors would do the actual work of distributing the movies to several copies and have it available for sale.
If the music publisher is Harry Fox affiliated, then you need to arrange and get permission from them. Otherwise if the music publisher is not affiliated you need to contact the publisher directly. The licensing fee depends on the number of copies to be sold or distributed. For example, the distributor would be paying high mechanical licensing fees if thousands or millions of copies would be distributed. Permanent digital downloads are also included in mechanical rights licensing.
Learn more about this topic on this post about what is a mechanical license agreement.
4. Performance rights – once the project has been released to the public (like shown in theaters), the music will be publicly performed along with the movie. Thus, any commercial use should pay performance royalties. However as an independent film maker, you are not responsible for this but only those commercial venues that publicly show your film. In this case, movie theaters, cable channels and television stations which are the ones releasing or using your film project will be the one to pay performance royalties not you. Read more about this in public performance music license.
watching movie in the public
Summary of Music Rights
Sync Rights – required all the time. So every independent film maker should clear these rights with the music publisher.
Master use rights – required as well. You need to ask permission from the owner of the sound recording which in this case might not be the music publisher or the songwriter of the song. You need to double check.
Mechanical rights – required. You need to clear this right so that the music and your film can be distributed in copies (DVD, hard drive, CD, blue ray, etc).
Performance rights – not required, unless you are the one that will be publicly perform the film in the public. In most cases, you are not.
In other aspects, you also need to ask permission about adaptation rights, so that means you can edit and adapt the song to whatever it suits with the film. This also needs to be negotiated with the music publisher. If you are showing the lyrics of the song in the screen, you need to be granted with print rights by the music publisher.
Content last updated on June 21, 2012