Is there a simple way to determine if a venue is in good standing with its BMI/ASCAP obligations?
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Determining ASCAP/BMI standing for a venue
- Thread starter bjm
- Start date
I dunno, but does it matter to you or a band? I could see possibly a moral reason of not wanting to play at a scofflaw venue. However, the venue, not the performers will get dinged, so there is no legal ramifications for a band to play at such a venue.
- Dec 13, 1999
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- Chuck Sher publishes my book, WALKING BASSICS:The Fundamentals of Jazz Bass Playing.
He may be more concerned with booking a gig and then having it cancelled by the venue wanting to avoid paying either a fine or the fee close enough to the date to make life Not Fun.
Thanks, Ed. You're pretty close. I drove 100mi to a gig yesterday only to find a wet stage in the rain and we couldn't safely set up. The venue didn't care and decided not to pay us because "other bands play in worse conditions". That just got me thinking...I wonder if there's a correlation between the royalty-avoiding, scofflaw venues and their general treatment of bands. I have a feeling there might be!
BTW, I bought your outstanding WALKING BASSICS book and have been working my way through it. Great, practical stuff in there!
BTW, I bought your outstanding WALKING BASSICS book and have been working my way through it. Great, practical stuff in there!
ASCAP, BMI, and other PROs don't want anyone to know their clear standing. That way the legal threats to pay up is more effective.
I've never once asked. Not my problem. it's the venue's problem. and I wonder how many venue's actually pay anything at all
Actually, most do. In all of my years of playing, I have been to one that didn't. I was filling in for an oldies band. They had speakers flying over the stage. On the backs of those speakers was a list of songs we could not play. This was because the owner refused to pay the fees. That put the onus... on us. (See what I did there?) There was a wave of BMI and ASCAP "spies" who came through our area a while back. They were able to bust a LOT of businesses for playing songs in "public areas". But they couldn't bust any venues I'm aware of. All of their "paperwork was in order". A couple of bar owners told me about it after it happened. They heard from others in the area as well. But all of them were on good terms.
(Two medical practices I'm aware of got cease and desist letters. They were told that if they were caught playing music in public areas again they would be fined/sued. One was a lady behind the receptionist desk streaming a local radio station on a bluetooth speaker primarily for her own enjoyment. But people in the lobby could hear it a little. The other was playing an XM Radio station through ceiling-mounted speakers down the hallways.)
