so , no one gets paid , the venue doesn't charge admission .
just a place to hang out and play guitar and sing if one feels like it ?

if you now charge to cover the SOCAN payments
you're running a business and should keep books
who is going to do that for free ?
do you now charge extra to cover the book keeper too ?

it starts to add up and eventually folks stop coming because of the cover charge
and now you have to pay to keep the talent interested and booked .


just keep it low key , pay no one , allow people to play for fun at a free venue.
why ruin a good thing?

 

so , no one gets paid , the venue doesn't charge admission .
just a place to hang out and play guitar and sing if one feels like it ?

if you now charge to cover the SOCAN payments
you're running a business and should keep books
who is going to do that for free ?
do you now charge extra to cover the book keeper too ?

it starts to add up and eventually folks stop coming because of the cover charge
and now you have to pay to keep the talent interested and booked .


just keep it low key , pay no one , allow people to pay for fun at a free venue.
why ruin a good thing?

Thanks oldjoat. Good thinking. As soon as you start charging you add a layer of admin and cost to something that gets its very identity out of volunteer community activity.

 

I understand that open mic is an amateur event so no money should be involved...keep it simple.

 

SOCAN seems like a scam.

 

Only if you’re not a composer, author or music publisher. For those of us who are, it works pretty well.

 

Registering tunes with SOCAN is the only way I get paid for the meagre airplay of any of my songs on radio or tv. However, I don't know of a single bar, coffee shop, etc. that pays SOCAN for live music. Paying the publishers and composers of songs is pretty much the last thing on most business owners' minds. And realistically, how could it ever be enforced? In a perfect world, artists get paid.

 

And realistically, how could it ever be enforced?

Really easy: (1) rep from performing rights society travels around to restaurants, bars, coffee shops, etc. who haven’t purchased licenses; (2) is music playing?; (3) if yes, is it music by an artist member of the society? (4) if yes, issue a demand letter to that venue requiring them to pay the fee or be subject to a damages claim under the Copyright Act.

 

no.

 

It’s legally required, yes. The performers might not be getting paid, but the venue is using public performance of copyrighted music for commercial purposes… to attract patrons. It’s no different than if they put up TV’s and showed a sporting event or a movie to bring people in. They’d have to pay the rights-holder for that too.

Whether the venue actually pays it or not is for them to decide. I know performing rights societies were really clamping down on it a few years ago. Not sure how strictly it’s being enforced right now.

Info here:

Welcome to Entandem - Entandem

entandemlicensing.com

 

This exactly. Are we going to shoot ourselves in the foot as musicians/composers? It's bad enough that streaming services and labels join forces to screw over royalty holders, we don't need to normalize it.

I understand that it's a small thing at the local coffee shop level, but it's still technically required. They are after all, running a commercial business. Same as if they were a nightclub or bar, or shopping mall, etc.

It's mostly the principal of it. When people and businesses continually devalue music, it becomes the norm. Then it makes it harder for it to be a viable career path.

 

I’ve heard of SOCAN reps visiting venues on open mic nights and even private events to make sure licensing fees are being paid. I’m not talking big venues either, small coffee shops etc.

To my mind, if you are working musicians that are doing covers in a paid gig, the ethical thing to do is make sure that the writers are getting their cut.

However, in an open mic environment where amateurs are banging out a few tunes for fun, let it be...because if you’re going that far, you might as well start sending out SOCAN narcs to every campfire in the country to crack down on all the unlicensed use of songs around the fire.

Common sense is the key, I think most artists would be happy popping in somewhere for a coffee and hearing an amateur artist performing their music.

 

To my mind, if you are working musicians that are doing covers in a paid gig, the ethical thing to do is make sure that the writers are getting their cut.

However, in an open mic environment where amateurs are banging out a few tunes for fun, let it be...because if you’re going that far, you might as well start sending out SOCAN narcs to every campfire in the country to crack down on all the unlicensed use of songs around the fire.

It’s not about whether the performer is getting paid, though, it’s about whether the music (be it live or recorded) is being used by a commercial venue to drive business. The fees have to be paid by the venue, not the performers. That’s what the laws are concerned with anyway.

 

I’ve seen references to ASCAP going after open mics in small places. Litigation, the whole bit.

 

Great, Wardo. Can you share any of those references? I found one.

Band, J., & Butler, B. (2013). Some cautionary tales about collective licensing. Mich. St. U. Coll. L. Int'l L. Rev., 21, 687.

The issue seems to boil down to the function or ethics of collective licensing as a system. Which is not the issue here.

From what folks have said on this forum, the bottom line is that an artist should be paid for each performance of his or her work/composition. The difficulty is in the enforcement (legally or culturally). It is illegal to steal, but often quite easy; it's my ethics that stops me.

 

OK , if the song / music is note for note and word for word ...
then keep track of it , send in your pennies
but just like they do for old plays and musicals,
many just change a few words or notes and call it a day
( not the "same" as the original , make it your own )

sure as heck , I won't be sending any money after singing "happy birthday"

Music publisher Warner/Chappell will no longer be allowed to collect licensing royalties on those who sing "Happy Birthday" in public and will pay back $14 million to those who have paid for licensing in the past, according to court settlement papers filed late Monday night.

Feb 10, 2016

 

deleted comment, moving to far from the original post..
excellent analysis by @Squawk

 

At a purely abstract conceptual level, sure. Business makes money from people doing covers, so the writers of the songs should get their fair share. Of course, we assume they are making money; many if not most places are barely hanging on post-pandemic, which is why they have we-don't-have-to-pay-performers open-mic nights.

At a shop-floor level, however, the revenue created for SOCAN in such contexts is likely much less than the overhead for processing and distributing such revenue. It becomes a bit like a user fee for penny candy from the gumball machine.

As an aside, one of the things that made Muzak "elevator music" so profitable was that they'd change a note here and there in a familiar tune - just enough to avoid copyright infringement.

 

The whole issue of fidelity to the original is a red herring, I think. Some performers don't always use the same lyrics for their own songs. Performance means adapting the composition to the audience. It's like rhetoric: the best possible performance of [song x] for these listeners. Muzak deserves (IMHO) to be busted for that note-change model because it's so patently phony.

 

Several years ago there was a bar my band had several gigs a year in that got hassled by Socan or one of them, so they stopped having bands in. I think the bar soon after went out of business. I guess a bar isn't much fun with out any music.
Socan, stamping out live music one venue at a time.
If a bar with live music and profit lines barely making it, what good does it do to extort them in to bankruptcy? If a venue is getting rich off of artists music, quite another thing.

 

Like I keep repeating: drafting policies that accomplish what they are intended to do, without producing unintended negative consequences is HARD. That's why so many policies, regardless of the level or institutional source, disappoint.

 

I don't know how SOCAN works, so I may be totally off in left field here:
Is a bar expected to keep track of (and write down) all the songs that a band plays so that SOCAN can spread the fees accordingly? What if the bar is employed by a young staff that can't distinguish between an original and an old obscure classic rock song that they don't recognize?

 

3 karaoke versions of " thank god I'm a country boy"
10 original songs by local artists
1 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture with full cannons

enclosed is a one dollar bill to cover SOCAN fees .

 

It may seem off-base, but I am reminded here of the lawsuit Gibson filed against PRS, alleging that the body shape of the PRS "single cut" infringed on the trademarked shape of the Les Paul. After decades and decades of letting everyone and their cousin make LP-shaped guitars, allowing their "trademark" claims to essentially lapse by not protecting them sooner, their legal department attempted to do what their marketing department should have long ago, by going after PRS. The case was justifiably thrown out.

Over time, the music industry has made it easier and easier to NOT compensate musicians. Overall sales of physical media has pretty much tanked - most of you will have a hard time finding a "record store" in your municipality - so musicians can't get a cut of record/CD sales that amounts to anything, unless they have a merch table at shows and market their own recordings. Streaming services pay an absolute pittance. Sheet music sales all but vanished for popular music decades ago (though it is hard to conceive of what sheet music would be for a great deal of what's popular these days). And if all of that wasn't bad enough, the market is flooded with people who believe they have some sort of future in music and MUST stay in it rather than get some other sort of employment (and have music as a hobby). So whatever money there might be has to be divided more ways than ever.

So SOCAN feels compelled to go after pennies and nickels, because the dimes and quarters have pretty much vanished. The industry made it easier for musicians to NOT earn a living in music, and the musicians and publishers simply left it too late.

 

Good point, mhammer. The music industry has changed so much that it's hard to tease out the ethical and legal requirements. SOCAN makes it sound easy: describe your event or show and ask them how much you should pay. But they lack credibility for most folks. Most owners I know are, frankly, not at the level to make sensible decisions in these grey areas.

 

I thought that venues that play any kind of music (radio, juke box, etc) had to pay a fee to Socan.

 

once again
if played note for note and word for word .

how many open mic participants qualify ...
usually their own interpretation of the chords / notes
that sounded good enuf.

 

or just play music that is over 70 years past the original artist's death.

(some big band stuff /C&W / Bluegrass / now qualify ) died before 1950

 

If SOCAN sends one of their agents to an event and a couple of their songs get played what is owed to SOCAN. Does it cover the cost of paying their staff member/agent for the night?

How do SOCAN agents enter a private function as I think was mentioned above. Do they have a warrant to breach the premises?

There are events often held in isolated parking lots in the north end of Toronto. Music is played. The occasional blast of small arms fire is not unusual at these events. I would like to see a SOCAN agent show up at one of those; see how that works out… lol

Everything is a scam. I’m guessing that SOCAN does all right while the so-called artists get barely enough from this riff to buy an ice cream cone.

The fact that these people and their ilk would go after someone for playing happy birthday is probably all you need to know.

 

OK ,OK ...
to keep things legit then :
post a notice and have a jar handy.

to those that are here to practice a song or two
you are welcome to use the stage as long as you clean up afterwards for the next artist

to those performing other artist's songs in front of our customers ,
please deposit 10 cents per song in the jar
and write the name of the song and the original author on the page beside it
so we can send it to the proper authorities.

The Management.

 

Don,t trust Socan.They are a money making corporation masquerading as a supporter of the arts.They love sucessful artists because it contributes to their revenue stream...I brought live music to thousands of people in the transit systems of Toronto and Vancouver but Socan demanded that those systems pay them fees for the stations where people busked,assuming we were all playing Neil Young songs I guess,and St.Neil needed more royalties.Never played an unoriginal song or tune in the Subway but T.O. and Van buckled to their demands with the result that grassroots musicians lost their livelihood because the transit systems paid Socan (buckled re freedom of speech)and then diminished the amount of places players could play in order to save money.My many emails and phone calls to Socan(I'm a member) went unanswered...don't trust 'em...unless you get successful,(a new revenue stream)...they are just another rapacious corporation...a business without conscience or awareness .. true north strong and free,laugh.