The process
Music Production | How does it work?
We offer music production at an affordable rate which includes an engineer & producer (typically the same person). Our music production service is perfect for singer-songwriters, rappers and artists looking to create their own original material for releasing commercially. We also offer the same service to those who already have their own compositions but find it challenging to complete the song or project. Sometimes a fresh ear and some additional production are all that’s required to push your song to completion.
The service includes programming, arranging, beat making, music composing, recording vocals, live instruments played if needed as well as all the technical experience to obtain all the sounds and production needed to take a song from its initial idea to finish.
Have an existing song that needs some additional production?
If you have an existing song idea and can’t seem to take it that step closer step further, then one of our highly skilled engineer/producers will be more than happy to help you co/produce your song with you and under your guidance.
Producers fees
A somewhat grey area for many but something that we like to be totally transparent about. The music production hourly rate does not include a “producers fee” as such and is typically taken out of an artist’s advance if signed to a label, management or publishing company.
However, we recognise budgets for unsigned/independent artists are tight and will work on a studio time/production rate to cover the producers time as long as the producer is credited, points are allocated and a split on publishing can be negotiated if the producer has brought something substantial to the song.
If the producer is involved in the creative writing process ie; composing additional chords or adding substantial changes to the overall sound of the song, then typically he/she becomes a writer of the song and is usually entitled to a percentage of the publishing of the song. Of course, the percentage split will be open to negotiation once the song(s) is completed.
What about Copyright,
Writers and Performance Royalties?
Another grey area for many artists is ‘what is copyright’. So first of all, copyright is the ownership of a song or body of work, which includes the audio files and the masters. Although there is no official way to copyright your sound recording, it is standard practice for the person who pays for the studio time to own the majority of the recordings’ copyright.
It is also standard practice to allocate a percentage of the ‘Sound Recording’ AKA ‘Master’ to the producer. This can be anything from 15-25% of the master depending on the producer’s involvement, creative input and what fee was paid to the producer for their services.
Those creatively involved (including producers, featured artists and musicians) must sign a consent form or musician’s release form to allow their involvement in the song to be distributed and released commercially. More info including the consent forms can be obtained from the Musicians Union
As an artist (or record label), you must register the writers of a song (this could be the artist/co-writers and the producer) with PRS and decide on splits once the song is complete.
You must also register the recorded work with PPL and list all the musicians and performers of a song – this can be highly beneficial to musicians registered with PPL to obtain performance royalties. More info at PPL.