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Business News Digital
Spotify engaging songwriters via Fair Trade Music initiative
By Chris Cooke | Published on Wednesday 6 May 2015
Spotify has reached out to the Fair Trade Music initiative, a consortium of songwriter groups bigged up by Jean-Michel Jarre in his CISAC capacity on World Intellectual Property Day last month.
The venture is seeking to provide songwriters worldwide with a united voice on the digital royalties debate. As previously reported, the songwriting community has become increasingly vocal in recent months over the monies writers receive from streaming services, with many feeling that the way the money is divvied up between the sound recording and song copyrights is unfair.
According to Music Ally, Spotify’s recently appointed Global Head Of Publisher Relations, James Duffett-Smith, confirmed that the streaming service – which has made a concerted effort in the past to reach out to artists, even though it mainly get its content from labels – is now also attempting to engage the songwriting community, even if it has no direct control over how streaming monies are split between the different music right stakeholders.
Duffett-Smith is quoted by Music Ally as saying: “Songwriters are the heart of the music industry and we welcome our relationship with Fair Trade Music. We’re looking forward to working in partnership with the songwriting community to help build a transparent and sustainable future for the entire music business”.
Meanwhile Eddie Schwartz and Rick Carnes of the Songwriters Guild Of America, one of the backers of Fair Trade Music, welcomed Spotify’s advances, saying: “We are delighted Spotify is the first major service to reach out to us to engage in this vital discussion and initiative. It’s encouraging to see a service as large as Spotify recognise our interdependence”.
As previously reported, the spotlight will be put on the digital pie debate at CMU Insights @ The Great Escape next week. Info here.
