Music Management Risks

The music business in itself is a tough business to work with. When working in this business as a manager or management company one has to consider all music management risks and prepare proper reaction when an unwarranted action occurs. For instance, over the last decade the music management risks have been extreme due to the excess of piracy via the Internet. These types of music management risks are those that any management team in today’s industry has to work extra man-hours to diminish the inevitable ability to illegally copy music from the artist.

 

There are even more music management risks to 

be discussed with the ubiquitous distribution of digital music. Some older artists have an issue of whether or not digital music should be treated as a license or sale. According to Ben Sisario (2011), in an article published by the NY Times “Four years ago, the producers who discovered Eminem sued his record label, the Universal Music Group, over the way royalties are computed for digital music, which boils down to whether an individual song sold online should be considered a license or sale. The decision made was one that would benefit the production company and Eminem millions of dollars for years to come, as well as set precedents for other artists. As stated by Sisario, “Eminem’s contract stipulates he gets 50 percent of the royalties for a license but only 12 percent for a sale.” In layman terms, if this were to remain the standard, there would be an injustice for the artist signed to a label more than a decade ago, with music sold online, due to the fact that digital music was not in use back then. Hence, the artist and production team makes a lot less money for a technology that wasn’t developed during the time of the signing to the label. The result of this case ruled in favor of the production company ruling digital music to be considered a license. This is more music management risks and precaution for any manager or management team to consider when working with an artist signed before the commencement of the sale of digital music to insure adequate revenue is received for the artist as is rightfully so.

 

In more recent news, like the popular band “Radiohead,” “R&B singer “The Weekend” suggests a new business model based on free music. The weekend released a new and very popular album via the Internet for free. Some would consider this a nightmare for the manager because of the lack in music sales, ergo lack in revenue.

Needless to say, there are several music management risks that a manager and or management company can encounter when maneuvering about in this business. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/28/business/media/28eminem.html?pagewanted=all

http://bragmedia.com/blog/?tag=music-industry-talk