PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

The international language of music – and royalties
by Earl Rosen

Several years ago, my wife and I were vacationing on the Korean island of Jeju. When we first arrived at our hotel, we heard some familiar music in the lobby: Canadian clarinetist James Campbell playing a song written by his son Graham. The recording was produced and the music published by our company, and we had licensed it to a Korean label. Since we had just come from the CISAC Congress in Seoul, I asked if the hotel was licensed by KOMCA, the Korean performing-rights organization, and it was.

This was a great example of the best aspects of globalization: music being performed around the world, and the creators and performers being compensated wherever their music was played.

The performing rights of creators are protected just about everywhere around the globe by performing-rights organizations linked together by reciprocal agreements and complex methods of data exchange and financial transfers. SOCAN is playing an important international leadership role within CISAC (the umbrella group of rights organizations) to develop the rules and the tools that ensure accurate and fair international distributions. The international experience our new CEO, Eric Baptiste, brings will ensure we continue to make an important contribution.

Of course, this is very important to SOCAN members. Every year, many SOCAN members earn a significant portion of their royalties outside Canada. In 2010, we project that our members will receive about $40-million in foreign earnings. While 75 percent of the international revenue comes from our top 10 partners, in 2009, SOCAN received international revenue from 54 countries. The amount has grown by almost 60 percent in the past 10 years, showing the increasing demand for our members’ music internationally. Canadian songwriters are known around the world, and our film, television and concert-music composers have their music played in many countries.

Of course reciprocal agreements work in both directions. In 2009, SOCAN paid royalties to 60 PROs around the world for music by non-Canadian creators that was performed in Canada. Not surprisingly, the most money went to the United States, but payments also went to countries such as Barbados, Bulgaria and Burkina Faso. With our multicultural society, it is not surprising that we enjoy and perform music from around the world.

It is a cliché to say that music is the international language, but the international flow of performance royalties proves just how international music has become.


Earl Rosen is president of the music label Marquis Classics and publisher De Sade Songs. He served a previous term as SOCAN president in 2003-06.

President's Message 2010

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