Investigating the Library Music Industry
Posted: 04.12.08
Once considered the fast food of the music industry, library music is now a significant resource for producers and a lucrative career option for composers. Rebecca Barry reports.
WWF Smackdown might seem an unlikely source of income for a British composer. But when the American wrestling show used a Universal music library track, the composer, Jules Bromley earned a cool £6000 in royalties.
“You could write something thinking you know what it’s going to be used for and 12 months later it’s on something completely different,” says Bromley, whose music has wound up – to his surprise – on Oprah, Big Brother and Antiques Roadshow to name a few. “It could be used in pornography or something you might not approve of but because it’s in the public domain anyone can use it as long as they pay the royalty.”
In the past 10 years, library music has emerged as a cheaper, more accessible, failsafe resource for producers
In the past 10 years, library music has emerged as a cheaper, more accessible, failsafe resource for producers – a necessity in an increasingly fragmented TV market. No one can agree on how much of what we hear on the box comes from music libraries but when you consider the big labels such as KPM add 50 albums a year to a library of 30,000 tracks, and that they’re competing with other major labels and up-and-coming publishers, its value as a resource is undeniable. Not everything we watch requires an original score so it’s often easier to “audition” downloaded or CD library tracks, as long as producers pay for the privilege via the Mechanical Copyright Protection Society (MCPS). When the production airs, the broadcaster must pay the Performing Rights Society. Both payments are generally disseminated equally to the composer and publisher.
It can take years before tracks generate income but when the money does start to trickle in, it can be extremely worthwhile.
It can take years before tracks generate income but when the money does start to trickle in, it can be extremely worthwhile. Perhaps more so for composers like Andy Quin, who stick to established, timeless genres rather than those that depend on popular, more fickle tastes. He has library tracks he wrote for his publisher De Wolfe up to 10 years ago that are still being used.
“Some tracks might earn a few pence or a fraction of a penny, others £20,000.”
“It’s probably one of the best possible sources of steady income for a musician,” says Quin. “Some tracks might earn a few pence or a fraction of a penny, others £20,000. It averages out to a good income.”
In fact, it was making some composers so rich – namely those whose music wound up on all-night quiz shows and other low-rating overnight programmes – that last year the PRS cut royalty rates for broadcasts outside of primetime hours (6pm-midnight). (SMN panellist Paul Farrer set up the ComposersForAFairDeal campaign, getting 752 to sign his petition in protest at the rates change.)
On the other hand, composer Neil Myers says only about 5 percent of his income comes from the library tracks he writes for North Star Music; the rest is commissioned. He acknowledges he’d make more money by submitting more music but prefers to treat his library work as a backstop, submitting tracks to keep busy if there’s not much commissioned work on the agenda.
“I have a very accommodating library publisher who is happy for me to pitch tracks from the archive that haven’t been used. It’s good because increasingly I’m finding the turnaround for commissioned work is very challenging – people are wanting music in 24 hours. It means I can keep the numbers up and nothing gets wasted.”
stock music tends to have a better shelf life.
That’s because stock music tends to have a better shelf life. It’s non-exclusive so music can be used repetitively, and depending on the publisher’s scope, broadcast all over the world. Still, stock music still carries around a tag of being ‘second-rate’ to bespoke composition, and can end up sounding like “music wallpaper”, says Myers.
“It doesn’t have the same emotional content as writing to picture but then you’re not paying for that so what do you expect?”
One music library composer who asked not to be named, said he felt guilty about the stock music he wrote, saying he didn’t like to put his publisher’s credentials on his CV.
“I know it’s hypocritical but I feel it’s putting people out of work. If a producer cuts the budget and they can’t afford to commission a composer, they’ll stitch something together from libraries. It can mean worse music that’s not coherent and not good for the viewer. I’d rather work on films because it’s more satisfying.”
“There’s always been a stigma surrounding library music,” acknowledges Bromley, “because 15 years ago it was like musak: dreadful. The production values were poor, there were no serious composers doing it, and quite rightly it was considered a cheap alternative to commissioned work. But in the last 15 years it’s been revolutionised. I’ve heard tracks that have blown me away.”
It can also be artistically rewarding. One of Quin’s favourite projects for his music library publisher, De Wolfe was composing a “soundalike” album of very early jazz, so little of the real thing has survived that the project required months of research. “It was absolutely fascinating and I loved doing the project,” he says.
Although writing stock music can be a platform for experimentation, free from the constraints of working with a director, there are a few rules the experts recommend budding stock writers follow. One is to treat a track like a pop song with a beginning, middle and end. It’s also useful if the track has a section suitable for voiceovers, and vital that it has a strong, conclusive ending.
“A decent library track has to be exceptional, you can’t just botch out a few tunes,” says composer and former director of Extreme Music Rupert Pope. “It’s good if it can be easily looped, not too cluttered with sections for editing, got to have an ending that resolves. It’s nice to give editors something to work with.”
"The growth in music production has led to a surge in services offering royalty-free production music, sold by fixed fee only, a controversial trend that worries many in the industry."
While the bigger music libraries tend to work with a roster of freelance composers, most accept demos, and some, such as Boost Music, actively solicit tracks or trawl websites such as Myspace for specific sounds.
“We'll send out a brief and we might receive 600 tracks for a 5 CD set. Then our producer will whittle these tracks down into rough 30+ track compilations," says Boost MD Martin Cooper. "We'll listen with a view to a track's commerciality before we commission the end piece."
Some music libraries are bypassing royalties altogether. The growth in music production has led to a surge in services offering royalty-free production music, sold by fixed fee only, a controversial trend that worries many in the industry.
“You get what you pay for,” says Pope. “If you have a low budget, it can make a lot of sense. But you’re not going to get great music for no money. There’s a place for it. A lot of composers get agitated that royalties undercut but it’s a free market. As long as composers are happy to do it for no royalties, then there’s nothing stopping them.”
“Composers need to research the kind of tracks that already exist, and be aware their music will probably be bundled into themes.”
Audio Network, a successful music library started in 2001, is not strictly royalty-free but by opting out of the MCPS scheme, they say they’ve made the process of paying for stock music easier. MD Simon Anderson says that by charging a fixed fee of £195 for unlimited use of their library per production, producers don’t have to worry about calculating their budget per 30-second chunks. Their composers still earn royalties from the PRS, on top of an upfront fee.
If you’re thinking about getting into music library composition, do your homework first, says Mark Fishlock, a composer and spokesman for the British Academy of Composers and Songwriters (BACS). “Composers need to research the kind of tracks that already exist, and be aware their music will probably be bundled into themes. There’s so much out there. Some tracks are really good but they never get used. It’s in the lap of the gods.”
“It’s all about volume and turnover,” adds Bromley. “When you first start, keep eye on your statements. They’re your only clue. I have a lot of stuff out there that I don’t know where it’s ended up. Some tracks might make very, very little. I might spend no time at all on something and it might make me an absolute fortune. There are so many unknowns, it’s out of your hands. You just have to keep churning them out.”
That’s particularly true given the amount of competition composers are now up against. Getting a track accepted onto a library music CD is becoming increasingly difficult thanks to the boom of bedroom producers, and the subsequent boom in music libraries to meet the demands of so many more TV channels. Coupled with the budgetary constraints producers now find themselves up against you have to wonder if music libraries are the way of the future. And if so, should we be worried?
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