Found in many of today’s contracts between a record label and a recording artist. This refers to the label’s efforts to obtain a share in all other rights and revenue streams related to the artist, in addition to the exclusive recording rights.

The songwriter retains full ownership of their copyrights.

Type of loan that serves as income for the artist or songwriter as they record or write songs and wait for royalties to generate revenue.

Refers to the period of time between an artist’s album, usually measured from the start of the recording to the end of marketing activities.

The Artist & Repertoire department of a record label is the portion of the record company that is responsible for finding new talent and convincing them to sign with their label.

Should act as your online home, being a website that hosts your social media links, biography, music links, images, etc.

Refers to money that’s earned but never paid out to any copyright holder, due to any one of several reasons.

This is a collection of an artist/writer’s music. Also known as a “discography”.

Type of licence allowing one to use all the compositions covered under the agreement with no limit on use for one payment.

A DSP user can access one or more services “bundled” together for the same price.

Handles an artist or songwriter’s finances and other logistics, typically without touching their personal lives.

Collection of works by one songwriter or one artist.

A record will be deemed by a record label to be “commercially satisfactory” when it has been judged to have a realistic potential to sell a reasonable amount of records.

Contains various recordings featuring multiple artists.

Free tickets offered for an artist’s concert.

It affects the mechanical royalties paid on a composition that is co-written by the recording artist.

This means that while the music publisher has ownership in the copyright and administers its exploitation, another publisher controls the other piece of the publisher’s share of ownership.

Grants protection under the law for original works of authorship fixed in a tangible form of expression.

Copyright Law of the United States, Title 17 of the United States Code. See http://www.copyright.gov/title17

Three-judge panel appointed by the librarian of congress to determine compulsory rates under the Copyright Act, among other responsibilities.

Noun – refers to a recording by an artist who is not the original songwriter
Verb – refers to the act of recording the song

Group of people besides those on stage hired by the artist or record label to work on a concert tour and travel with the artist from venue to venue

Customer Relationship Management – originated in business enterprise software suites. It refers to functions for handling interactions with fans.

Refers to the recoupment of advances from multiple resources. Typically included in a recording contract to reduce risk imposed on the record label.

Software or computer program used to record, edit and produce music. Example: ProTools, Logic and Ableton

Refers to the specifications in a recording contract by which an artist may submit masters to a record label for potential release.