Copyright tasksheet

1. Megan Hughes
Unit 45 Commercial Production for Radio
What is musiccopyright?
Music copyright is given to musicians, artists, songwriters and composers for legally
protecting their work to ensure they get recognised and paid for what they created. For
example, if a writer got copyright on a certain piece of music it therefore means it must not
be broadcasted without it being cleared, reported and paid for with the PRS or PLL.
How do musicians get paid?
Money musicians get paid in ‘royalties’ when their work is used by someone else or played
on the radio/TV. The PRS for music and PPL, which are two organisations that help protect
musicians and their work, collect the money used for copyrighting and manage the
musicians’ payments to ensure the correct people get rewarded for the work being put out
there. When it comes to getting paid from the copyright organisations it’s not always easy as
a single piece of music can have several composers, writers, publishers, etc.. And all of
these people own part of the copyright.
What is PRS?
The PRS for music is a society of songwriters, composers and music publisher that license
organisations to play, perform or make available copyright music. A mission of theirs is to
distribute the resulting royalties to their members fairly and efficiently. They also promote
and protect the value of copyright for musicians. The PRS for music are the ones in charge
of giving clearance to allow the use of certain pieces of music publicly and they also handle
the cue sheets that people use for reporting what songs and artists they have used on their
production.
Explainthe process ofgaining clearance for musiccopyright
The PRS for Music and PPL represent thousands of composers and musicians and can also
provide clearance for the public to use a certain piece of music without breaking the

2. Megan Hughes
copyright law. If there are musicians who are not represented by PRS for Music or PPL then
you would have to go to the composer or the record label directly to obtain permission and
get clearance to ensure you’re using it with consent.
Blanket agreements
A blanket licence agreement is mostly used by large independent production companies and
broadcasters, such as the BBC. Instead of without obtaining an individual licence every time
a piece of music is used, they pay a yearly fee to PRS for Music which allows them to use
any PRS-managed music whenever they want within this time. If you are part of a production
company, they or the broadcaster will manage and pay the blanket licence agreement with
PRS for Music, so then individually you won't have to pay for the music directly from your
budget, but at all times you must still fill in a music cue sheet to report what you are using in
regards to royalties. On the other hand, if you’re part of a smaller company and you don’t
have direct people in a department to contact the PRS, you would still have to do it by
contacting the music owner or whoever yourself ensuring you are aware that the composer
or record company can turn down your request for clearance if the fee isn’t enough or the
context of use doesn’t appeal to them.
Due to there being set different blanket agreements you would have to make yourself certain
of what the agreement genuinely covers as there can be music that can fall outside the
scope so always double check how and what music you can use within your programme.
Reportingmusic use and what happenedif a broadcaster failsto do this.
Another term for reporting your music is paying for it. No matter whether you have cleared
the music by going through PRS for Music or the artist directly to ask for permission, you still
need to report it. You can do this by filling in a cue sheet of the music you have used that will
eventually make its way to PRS for music and PPL for them to review and authorise to keep
on top of other things affected such as royalties. It’s important that whenever you start on a
new production, you make sure you familiarise yourself with the process of reporting the
music through the que sheet because each company will most likely have a different system.
The consequences are that if you don't get clearance for your use of the copyrighted music
and/ or don’t report it to PRS or PPL for any reason, you could face legal action for copyright
infringement and could even become liable to pay damages and costs. So it’s always better
to abide by the law and go through the process the correct way.