Understanding ASCAP and BMI

[Joe Nerve]

This is long overdue for me. Should have been taken care of years, if not decades ago, but better late than never. Need some help understanding this.

I understand what these companies do, basically help you get paid when your music is played, but I don't know much more than that and I have some specific questions before I sign up with one of them. This may get a little long winded, but I'd appreciate if ya stuck with me.

While in The Nerve the guitarist took care of all of this. He signed us up with ASCAP. I was under the impression that our songs were listed under The Nerve, and my name was in there. I know some money was made, but not much and at that particular time I said he could keep it, as he needed it more than I. Years have passed... saving the long story, today (after I asked him for specific info) he told me that he only registered under his name, and that he never registered my songs. Which I don't believe because it makes no sense, and that's not what he told me at the time it was done, but that's another story.

Fast forward. I co-wrote some songs with a woman I'm no longer playing with and she asked if I was with ASCAP or BMI... and under what name (joe nerve, or my birth name). Said I would be credited. She makes money off of her music (gets a lot of placement in TV and movies), and well, I need to do this. My main questions:

1. With the nerve songs being on ascap, if I join ascap can I find out what money has been made with it, and/or if my name has been included in the past? Or is that something only my ex bandmate will ever have access to?

2. Can I now register MY nerve songs (the ones I wrote) with one of the agencies? Even if he did register them as part of an album?

3. What happens if the other guy already registered those songs?

4. Which of these 2 should I go with and why would one be any different than the other? My music would mostly fall into the rock/pop category.

Any answers or other info would be appreciated also. I finally want to get moving with this, but have to break through a thin wall I'm not even sure what. Thanks.

 

[Joe Nerve]

bump

 

[Jazzdogg]

Contact ASCAP, they oughta be able to tell you

 

[jmattbassplaya]

I'm interested in this as well. While I don't see this being an issue with my band anytime soon, I'd rather go into a situation like this a little more educated than the rest of my group.

 

[Music Attorney]

This is long overdue for me. Should have been taken care of years, if not decades ago, but better late than never. Need some help understanding this.

I understand what these companies do, basically help you get paid when your music is played, but I don't know much more than that and I have some specific questions before I sign up with one of them. This may get a little long winded, but I'd appreciate if ya stuck with me.

While in The Nerve the guitarist took care of all of this. He signed us up with ASCAP. I was under the impression that our songs were listed under The Nerve, and my name was in there. I know some money was made, but not much and at that particular time I said he could keep it, as he needed it more than I. Years have passed... saving the long story, today (after I asked him for specific info) he told me that he only registered under his name, and that he never registered my songs. Which I don't believe because it makes no sense, and that's not what he told me at the time it was done, but that's another story.

Fast forward. I co-wrote some songs with a woman I'm no longer playing with and she asked if I was with ASCAP or BMI... and under what name (joe nerve, or my birth name). Said I would be credited. She makes money off of her music (gets a lot of placement in TV and movies), and well, I need to do this. My main questions:

1. With the nerve songs being on ascap, if I join ascap can I find out what money has been made with it, and/or if my name has been included in the past? Or is that something only my ex bandmate will ever have access to?

2. Can I now register MY nerve songs (the ones I wrote) with one of the agencies? Even if he did register them as part of an album?

3. What happens if the other guy already registered those songs?

4. Which of these 2 should I go with and why would one be any different than the other? My music would mostly fall into the rock/pop category.

Any answers or other info would be appreciated also. I finally want to get moving with this, but have to break through a thin wall I'm not even sure what. Thanks.

It's going to require some time to really address your issues. Will try to do so this weekend. You may want to bump the thread back up to the top on Saturday if the discussion doesn't continue through then (i.e., out of sight out of mind).

Best,
MA

 

[ksandvik]

You can't re-register old songs, only new ones.

You can only belong to one organization but it's quite OK to get royalties from the other performance organizations into your account on your specified membership.

BMI or ASCAP, ASCAP or BMI, BMI or ASCAP, ASCAP or BMI... Pick the one you like. I picked BMI long time ago as ASCAP didn't have a decent web interface for registering work (has now.) Also I'm no fan of the ASCAP warfare against Creative Commons et rest (Invalid Link Removed) but that's just my own opinion.

 

[Jeffrey Wash]

I would think the first question to answer is who owns the copyrights? (ASCAP has a system in place to help songwriters with the copyright process, however registering songs with ASCAP should not be confused with copyright registration).

If your guitarist says he only registered his songs with ASCAP, then that would imply that those tunes are also copyrighted in his name. If that's the case, then I'd think that starting from scratch, copyrighting your back catalogue of tunes and getting them registered with ASCAP would be the best place to start.

Maybe do a search at Library of Congress for all of The Nerve songs, find out which ones are copyrighted and which ones (presumably all of yours) are not...

 

[Music Attorney]

You can't re-register old songs, only new ones.

Not correct.

Performing Rights Societies (PROs) such as BMI and ASCAP have a term (i.e., duration) to their agreements. Once the term of a PRO agreement (e.g., with ASCAP) expires, the songs that were registered with ASCAP can be registered with a different PRO (e.g., BMI) with one proviso: the PRO affiliation with a song that's subject to any particular license that’s issued during the term of that PRO agreement must remain intact for the duration of the term of that particular license. Other than that, registered songs are capable of being moved and registered somewhere else.

For example, if a license to perform a song registered with ASCAP has a term that goes in perpetuity (e.g., the right to perform the song in a movie), then the ASCAP affiliation will remain with that song as it relates to the use of the song in that movie. That is, if your ASCAP membership ends, you can't make the movie company re-register that song in the movie because the license that was entered into during the term of your affiliation with ASCAP contained terms with the movie company that continued on after your affiliation with ASCAP ends.

However, after your affiliation with ASCAP ends, you could certainly register that same song with BMI and use it in a different movie.

More to come.
MA