The Waterfront Partnership

Creation and Ownership

Ownership of musical compositions

The law of copyright protects both 'musical works' and 'literary works'. If you write a song, the tune will be protected as a musical work and the lyrics will be protected as a separate literary work.

Ownership of copyright is automatic and does not, in the UK and many other countries, require any form of registration or formal assertion of ownership. It is, however, sensible to keep copies of anything that shows the creative process that you went through to create the work, as this can be used as evidence if anyone ever claims that you copied the work from them.

As the owner you have the right to exploit the copyright and derive commercial benefit from it, and you can do this relatively freely, without statutory constraints (although you may need the permission of your co-writers if you have co-written a song - see below).

Ownership of Recordings

There may be numerous more than one recording of a composition, sometimes by different people - for example, Don MacLean's "American Pie" has also been recorded by Madonna, and Fauré's Requiem has been recorded by orchestras and choirs all over the world.

As with musical and literary works, sound recordings are protected by copyright. The rights in a sound recording are usually known as the 'master rights' (because the owner has the rights in the master recording, from which all other copies are made).

Master rights are owned by "the person by whom the arrangements necessary for the making of the recording ... are undertaken". This is usually considered to be the recording artist (who may or may not be the same person as the songwriter or composer).

Joint Ownership

Sometimes more than one person will be involved in creating a composition or recording. For example:

• if separate people own the music and lyrics one will own the copyright in the musical work and the other in the literary work;
• a songwriting team may write their songs together and each contributor may be a joint owner of both the musical and literary work in the song;
• a band may write and record a song together and each band member may be the joint owner of the musical and literary works and the master rights.

Where a song is co-written it is sensible to come to an agreement as to each co-writer's input into the song and the appropriate share of the song that each co-writer should own. This can be done on a song by song basis or as part of a Band Agreement or Co-writer Agreement - where two or more people agree to write together on an ongoing basis.

It is very common for numerous people to take part in creating a recording. It is therefore important that everyone has a clear understanding in advance of whether they will own rights in the resulting recording. For example, some producer agreements provide for a small percentage of the recording to be owned by the producer (usually 1-3%). This will entitle him or her to receive royalties whenever the record is sold. Session musicians, on the other hand, are usually paid a one off fee and do not own any share of the recording.

Sample Clearance

Another way in which joint ownership can arise is where a recording artist, producer or DJ uses one or more samples of another person's song or track in a new song. In this situation it is very important for the owner of the new recording to obtain permission to use the sample - this is known as 'clearing' the sample.

In exchange for the sample owner's permission to use the sample, the owner of the new recording will usually agree to give the sample owner a share in the master rights.

Failure to clear a sample can lead to the owner of the new recording being sued for copyright infringement by the owner of the sample and, in some cases, the court can award a very large proportion of the song to the sample owner.