Music Licensing: Using Music In Your Films & Videos

You asked us about music licensing, so here’s some info. As a festival, it’s a legal requirement for us to ask filmmakers who submit to us to ensure they have the rights to any music they have used.

But it can be a confusing subject. So here’s a basic explainer.

Disclaimer: the following does not constitute legal advice. It’s simply to give someone who knows next to nothing about the subject an introduction.

Let’s start from the basics. Anything you create, without infringing the copyright of others, belongs to you at the point of creation. However, proving it belongs to you can be a tricky matter.

Right now, there are legal battles going on about who owns what – especially if what is suddenly worth a lot of money and prestige.

But I assume if you’re reading this, you’re not about to launch a case against Netflix. Most likely, you made a short film or shot a video you intentend to upload to YouTube. When it comes to music use rights, however, you are in the dark.

For over 10 years, I wrote music for a large publishing company, so I understand the basics of music rights. This is how it looks from the composers side.

One thing to know, there are 2 forms of music rights: performing and mechanical.

Put simply, performance royalties are for the performances of your music (say, if your song is played on TV, in a supermarket or another artist/s sings or performs it in public).

Whereas mechanical royalties are gained from using the actual recording of the work (if it belongs to you).

As composers working in the UK, we had to become members of a royalty collection organisation called PRS (Performing Rights Society). As the name suggests, it is this organisation’s task to collect global royalties for artists – but specifically the performance side.

The mechanical royalties are handled by another organisation. In our case, it was our publisher who collected them for us. This means that every 6 months we receive a payment from PRS for any use of our music in the past (which they know about and have managed to collect). We also receive a payment from the publisher of our music (in our case Warner/Chappell Production Music).

Using music.

I’m also a filmmaker. So I have need to use music for my films, too. It helps that I can write my own music, of course. This removes any rights issues.

But if you don’t have that option, what can you do?

In a regular commercial production – a film, TV show or video advertisement, for example – it is normally the producer’s job to manage the license of music rights.

If the music is “off the shelf” (ie: not specifically written for your production), you’ll need to do a deal with the owner. This is normally the publisher, not the artist. In the event the artist doesn’t have a publisher, then you need to deal with them directly.

If a publisher owns the music, they will almost certainly demand a fee. This is the mechanical part of the music royalty I spoke of earlier.

The performance part is determined by (in very general terms) using film plays plus audience size. But, as a film’s producer, this is not your concern. It is the duty of the venue, channel or platform showing the film to pay performing rights royalties.

But this music is epic and makes my video look awesome, so who cares?!

Filmmakers often submit films with unlicensed music. I mean, it’s obvious – usually the quality of the music is way above the standard of the film. eg: a roughly executed thriller with some professionally produced Hollywood-style orchestral piece, thrown on top.

Really, you’re just making your film look even worse. You’re a low-to-no budget filmmaker, not Michael Bay. But, you know, here at MoMo FF we consider that to be a good thing – so no need to try to pretend you’re something you’re not.

That music doesn’t improve your film. If anything, it shows you’ve been a bit lazy when it comes to the music. And as a composer and filmmaker, I recommend you put as much thought into the music as the rest of the production.

I don’t have any money.

You made your film for nothing. You can barely afford to feed the cast and crew, let alone pay a composer.

Well, you are in luck. Low-to-no cost music resources are plentiful in the digital age. Yay.

Look, you’re an aspiring filmmaker, working with minimal resources. Hoping one day to be working with proper budgets so you can pay everyone for their hard work. Guess what – there are composers in exactly the same situation. They’re hoping one day to make a career of it, but at this stage they might just write you something for the credit and the experience.

Apart from that, YouTube has a music library full of music to use under varying terms – many of them free. Facebook also has one (for use in Facebook videos only, at this moment, I believe).

There are also composers who put their work on YouTube, Soundcloud or other places, some offering it for credit only. Some offer their music free IF used on a “non-commercial” project.

Note: for filmmakers submitting to festivals, “non-commercial” is a grey area. You might not be intending to make money from your short, but the festival will probably be charging an entrance fee to watch it. So, in that sense, it is technically a commercial project.

YouTube

Over the last decade, YouTube has become a major platform for aspiring filmmakers and vloggers. Being a YouTuber is now a viable career path. And sometimes we get asked how music rights work for this platform. Indeed, it is a special case.

The good news is that YouTube is doing most of the producer’s job for you. Well, as long as you only want to distribute your video on YouTube, and nowhere else.

This is because YouTube has agreements with publishers and pays royalties to those publishers for the use of their music. This is how it works…

After you upload a video the YouTube algorithm scans the audio track. If the algorithm spots that the music belongs to a publisher, the platform places adverts automatically. However, you will not receive revenue from those ads. Instead, it goes to the publisher.

They also have a searchable list of music policies for individual tracks. Here’s YouTube’s own advice video:

It’s complicated.

Yes, copyright is a massively complex subject. Of course, apart from being an annoying obstacle to your creative freedom, it’s also protecting your rights over your work, as well.

In fact, the publisher we worked for employed the skills of a trained musicologist to make sure the music they were publishing didn’t infringe the copyright of other artists. They also engage in repeated legal battles over claims of breach of copyright.

Copyright is a system whereby artists can be paid a fair (lol) amount for their work. But, be warned, it’s also a keenly contested war zone.

If you’re serious about being a filmmaker, it will serve you well to understand a basic level of copyright law. Not just for music, but for other rights, such as image and story.

On the other hand, you don’t want to get bogged down in it, either. If you’re at the low budget level of filmmaking, to save yourself too much pain, I really recommend you avoid using music owned by publishing companies.

Approach the music for your film the same way you approach the filmmaking. Be creative, be resourceful, but respect the work of others.

Music Resources for Low-Budget Film and Video

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