Do session players get paid by album sales? If so, what is a typical payment?

What portion of income that you subsist on comes from royalties for sales, versus radio play, versus actual fees for the session, and how does all this compare to live work?

Essentially, how much of a loss is represented by flat out theft of recordings?

I have heard headliners make more on a decent tour than they make on record sales... but I don't know how that compares to the players.

As I understand it, the only people who make any money on airplay are the publisher and the writer and unless you're the label, or the artist has a very good relationship (or lawyer) with the label, you can forget about sales. Most likely, the only money that you're going to see is what you got paid for the session or the tour.

I have a very good relationship with my label, partly because it's a "vanity label", which means I pay for everything up to delivering the finished cd's to Cold Blue, (the label is in charge of distribution and marketing), and because not too many people buy this kind of music, so we're like a small family.

Of course, when downloading reduces sales, this is passed on to the players in smaller checks.

Also, the employer pays an additional 10% of the session fee into the union pension fund of the player (including demos), so that is an additional benefit (or kind of a royalty) for the session player. There is also a fee paid for health insurance.

I hope whatever comes up after the current music distribution system falls apart and the dust settles leaves room for musicians to make a living.

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My Website..... www.cmedic.net/~almarcus/

With our entry into the EEC, this was deemed illegal, and a body called PPL(?) was formed to distribute vast sums of money to all musicians who had ever done sessions.

What an undertaking - we were all scrambling for our diaries and collating all the info we could on the sessions we'd done. I had to go back to 1962 but it was worth it - I had a pretty big cheque at the end of the day. Now, I receive much smaller, but regular, cheques based on airplay on those recordings; naturally, as time goes on, they're played less and less, so.....

The other source of retrospective income for me is the TV work I've done - as the various programmes are repeated, or sold to cable, money automatically finds its way to my account. This, too, gets less and less as I'm no longer active in the London music scene, but, as we say in the Old Country, it's better than a poke in the eye with a pencil.

The entire music community (Songwriters, musicians, artists, producers, labels, etc.) certainly understands why? and would love to see it change.

Maybe you can understand "Why?" the dilemna we face is impossible to change at this juncture, with this scenario.

Think of radio as Walmart. It is the only complete source for selling your quality line of clothing to the masses in the USA. You offer them a suit line made from the finest materials and explain how they will outlast everything on their floor three times over.

They say repeatedly, "NO", "Our demographic doesn't want it so we will not stock it. Bring us a line of suits cotton / rayon mix and we don't care if it unravels after the fourth drycleaning, nor does our consumer care, judging from how much we sell, we'll take all you got......"

What would you do?

Everyone is hoping the internet, satelite radio and television will offer in the future an alternative solution to getting great music out to the masses. The labels for the last ten years or so are remastering alot of their archived music for catalogue sales which is why we can find cool box sets and CD compilations of many of the greatest artists of the past. Everyone cares about the history. Nobody has solved the dilemna of how to get past radio to the consumer.

Radio reaches over 200 million people, The internet and satelite radio gets to a few million at present and that is not enough to support an entire music community.

Music is a buisiness of selling art.

"When there are no dealors for the real stuff, the artists have to paint road signs for a living".

...Paul

[This message was edited by Franklin on 30 January 2004 at 06:27 AM.]

Fortunately, those who look beyond the conglomerates are giving rise to Internet radio and low-power FM stations, which may have hope of eventually (it'll be a while) breaking the stranglehold that the Clear Channels of the world have over one's access to art and information. I think one positive from downloading is that, with it's popularity, many participants may hear something fresh and creative that really grabs them and ignites their curiosity enough to turn them from a casual listener to an active listener. That said, it is imperative that the copyright holder have the final say as to how his/her music is treated. Some artists like the free publicity of having their songs trading across the Internet. Others think it is hurting their sales. Each party needs to be able to call his/her own shots and have the decision be enforceable.

If you have any question as to why listeners might be putting up with such small playlists of relatively bland material, just look how little value the conglomerates place on art. Lowry Mays, CEO of Clear Channel, told Fortune magazine in March: "If anyone said we were in the radio business, it wouldn't be someone from our company. We're not in the business of providing news and information. We're not in the business of providing well-researched music. We're simply in the business of selling our customers products." Such cheapening and exploitation of art is bound to bring about a backlash eventually. It's just going to be a pretty boring ride until large numbers of people begin taking their demographics to alternative sources. But if people remain complacent, things will likely never change.

To reiterate, I don't myself download music. I tend to listen to bands that are comparitively "Mom and Pop" operations, on small labels. I know that I am putting my $10 or $15 directly into that artists pocket (pretty much). I don't buy things I've heard on the radio, at least not in the longest time I can remember... digital music feeds, local bands, following threads of recommendations based on artists I love etc.

But I didn't want to make this into a thing about "The radio business is awful" or "Downloading is good/bad theft/not theft"... though let the thoughts go wherever they may.

I really wanted to get a direct impression from real live pros on their experience wallet-wise in the past few years... but this is all insteresting and instructive.

So thanks to all you guys who shared your time, and impressions on it... keep it coming!

[This message was edited by Nicholas Dedring on 30 January 2004 at 09:56 AM.]

I was told last week by a pretty heavy hitter that the main reason sales are off is because Radio has impacted our ability to showcase new artists and songs. New music promotes sales. Most of the time folks hear their favorite songs so often that they have no desire to purchase the CD.

Not being able to get music on the air is a trickle down problem felt by all....Paul

OR you create pap for the masses that sells products to demagraphic markets that the advertisers will pay to reach.
Nothing more nothing less.

A) Demand is being controlled/managed by ever-larger corporations whose only goal is to turn a profit (a la Clear Channel, which controls not only a hug amount of radio but alos an increasing number of concert venues)...As the CEO implied, they're nothing more or less than a cash machine.

B) Supply is undergoing a revolution is the form of home-based digital recording, which allows for an excellent quality product at a fraction of yesteryear's price.

First, having access to new kinds of music awakened my interest in artists and genres I never knew about. From the time I downloaded my first illegal tune, my CD purchases have increased about five fold over what they were previously. And most of those purchases are of artists that I never would have known or cared about previously.

The other thing that happened is the emergence of legitimate online music services. I no longer download illegally, but I'm convinced that if I (and others) hadn't, the legitimate online services would never have come about. With eMusic, iTunes, mp3.com, etc., I'm happy and legal.

Ditto's!!!
I love all three of those records. Yes and No is my answer to advancement. Both of those records sound very digital to my ears and alot of todays records have gone past that hard digital sound. Norah Jones and alot of non mainstream artists are making great sounding records.

On the Yes record there is alot of recorded tricks, or smoke and mirrors, but it is still brilliant art to the max. Personally, I still prefer making records as a band and not completely layering a record one musician at a time.

As for solo's I wish we would go back to more picking and less dancing on stage.

I am usually asked to play long solos on most of Alan's and Strait's records. Five O'clock Somewhere turned out to be the biggest hit Alan has ever had and there is over 16 bars of steel and about the same amount of guitar solo's counting the fade. I have already experienced a change in requests for solo's because of that records impact.

I'm with you, I wish the sounds of instruments were featured more often. If you can judge anything by my calls, steel solo's seem to be coming back.

I agree. Our only hope lies in congressional intervention.

Sonny

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http://geocities.com/sonbone1
sonbone@geocities.com

Also you mentioned Re-released material, I have been picking up some of my old favorites
from the past, and the Remastering on some
of it is much improved from earlier CD releases, As an example, Van Halen 2, is
better now than the record, I had to leave the room and collect my senses after Eddie's
solo on "Your No Good",

All the CD's mentioned above were pieces
of Art, but they also Sold Millions, People
had to have them, they were in a sense, Out
of Reach, you Had to purchase the product,
you couldn't sample the music on the net.
Different Consumer today,

Paul, what do you remember about Air Studios
in London, that stands out from other Studios, seeing that "On Every Street" was recorded there, the same place 90125 was done? Just Curious, Cheers, Greg