When Frank Sinatra Endorsed a Radio Station

[TheBigA]

One of the ways some record labels got around that in the US was to have their artists record songs published by a company owned by the label.

That's part of it. In addition, when they sign artists, if that artist writes, his songs are published by the labels publishing company. Plus, there are 360 deals, where labels get a portion of their artists merch or touring revenue. That is never mentioned in any of the discussions about the radio royalty. This issue of labels wanting money from radio goes back 60 years to Sinatra. But in that time, the labels have found ways to get a portion of that money without having the legislation. In other words, as you said, radio is already paying them the royalty through the publishing. If they get their label royalty, they won't give back the portion they already take from the artists. The new money will just be added to the publishing money they already make.

This has become a bigger issue because of streaming. The labels want to equate radio with streaming. That's what they said in the congressional hearing last year. What they ignore is that streaming is digital, and that's why they get the royalty. Broadcasting is analog and not covered by DMCA. They want broadcast radio included under digital copyright without allowing it to become digital.

 

[Ed Nielson]

And, in the years of James Petrillo's dictatorial leadership of the American Federation of Musicians, the union required most metro area stations that played recorded music to have a proportional amount of live music from a station band or orchestra.

This worked out in the union's favor as in the later 30's and much of the 40's, the hits were songs, not just the specific versions of a song. So there could be a number of recordings of a song, and having a live band do their interpretation was considered "the same". But as time passed, it became most important to have the "hit version" of a song and stations did not want... nor did their listeners... to hear what today we call "covers".

www.worldradiohistory.com has both the AFM magazine from that era as well as a collection of publications about Petrillo and the union.

JAMES CAESAR PETRILLO: Controversial leaderof Musicians' Union

(Thanks for the link and the reference to the Beeb's music policies)

So far I only read the first Reader's Digest article from 1940. He was certainly a colorful character.