IPRS Newsmailer

Dear Songmakers,

Songs are like perfumes. A perfume maker tries to capture the essence of a flower or a spice in a small bottle. It’s an arduous task, but once a perfume is bottled, it is ready to make every space better by just being released in the air. It is the same with songs. A songwriter tries to capture the essence of feelings, emotions, and human experience then distills this essence into a small bunch of notes and words and creates a song that makes every space better by just existing. Well, some songs are noisier than others, just like some perfumes are more robust than others.

What I’m trying to say is, song-makers like you and me make our world a better place by just existing, and they need to be celebrated, coveted, and rewarded. IPRS and other royalty collection companies across the globe exist expressly to serve this purpose. The good thing is, our IPRS is holding its neck high above amongst its peers. Just this year, IPRS has been called ‘the fastest growing’ royalty collection agency in the world by CISAC. From collecting a mere 34 crores in 2017 to collecting and distributing around 175 crores this year! Yes, IPRS is growing very, very fast. And it couldn’t have happened without your support and the visionary leadership of its Board of directors.

The Indian music industry is dominated by film music due to the enormous amount of content produced every year. The Telugu film industry is one of the three largest in India which automatically makes the Telugu music industry amongst the largest in the country.

Over the years Telugu songs have been dubbed or recreated by Bollywood or other regional industries. The third most spoken Indian language has a huge diaspora spread across the world which makes the content attractive to the digital platforms.

The Telugu music industry has taken giant strides over the years and is growing exponentially. The industry’s continuous evolution has ensured changes within the industry, especially the distribution and promotion of the songs. Now with the digitally-driven industry, the market is heavily competitive and the players are not shying away.

Satarupa Sanyal is a Bengali independent or parallel cinema film director, producer, actress, poet, and social activist, based in Kolkata. She is well known for her feminist social stances that inform her films. She is trained in Hindustani classical music and Rabindra Sangeet and performed for the All India Radio. She received the National Film Award for Best Lyrics for Chandaneer in 1990. 

Born in a musical family, Bindhu Malini has trained both in Carnatic and Hindustani music and is influenced by the poems of saint Kabir and the songs of Kumar Gandharva. She has received National Film Award for Best Female Playback Singer and Filmfare Award for Best Female Playback Singer – Kannada for her songs in the movie Nathicharami. She has composed and recorded songs for films and albums in Tamil, Hindi, and Kannada languages.

The term ‘multi-faceted’ suits Parvathy more than most. She has been an Avant-garde theatre artist, journalist-political commentator, anchor, poet, and lyricist. She has released two anthologies of Tamil poetry namely ‘Ippadikku Naanum Natpum’ and ‘Idhu Vaeru Mazhai’. After her second book of poetry, she decided to enter the film industry and is now a lyricist for Tamil films.

Music licenses are the most crucial way music creators and publishers get royalties for their musical works. It provides legal permission to someone who’d like to utilize their work. Business units do not have the authority to play music in public places for any commercial purpose without acquiring a music license. Copyright Act, 1957 made it mandatory for all the cafes, restaurants, hotels, pubs, bars that play pre-recorded music on their premises to obtain a music license.

The Indian Performing Right Society Ltd. (IPRS) aims to drive awareness towards Fair Pay and Fair Play of music by emphasizing the significance of abiding by the licensing norms. In our monthly series #AskAmeet with leading IP lawyer – Ameet Datta, we will try and explain the legal aspects surrounding the music industry in as simple terms as possible. You can mail us your queries. We will try to accommodate as many as possible.

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Information technology is ubiquitous today. It became apparent during the COVID period where the wheels of commerce ran on the services provided by Information Technology (IT). At IPRS, we also reinvented ourselves with the changing dynamics of music consumption which witnessed a radical shift with the advent of Digital Service Providers. And with it, the role of IT became pervasive since it is impossible to process billions of lines of data manually to identify works of our members and claim them for royalty payout.  

The work becomes more challenging since the data in the burgeoning music industry, which has embraced digital-first, is yet to be structured in a fashion to be shared across platforms in a single structure. Organizations like CISAC and DDEX are trying to bring order into the chaotic world, introducing new standards and policies periodically. IPRS had readily adapted to these changing world standards. Keeping with its vision to bring transparency to its members, it has tied up with BackOffice Music services, a globally reputed backend service provider to multiple CMOs, to provide a world-class Members Portal.

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This session of EmpowerHERMUSIC is titled ‘Grab the Moneyball! Before it Falls!!!’ featuring Soumini Sridhara Paul, Senior Vice President, Hungama Digital Media Entertainment Private Limited, and Heena Kriplani, Head, Tunecore India. The discussion aims to help artists/music creators scout new revenue-generating avenues, explore the role of a music label and an aggregator in an artist’s success, and guide the artists to brand themselves for maximum monetary utilisation.

Artists/Songwriters/Creators are now exploring the DIY route to directly streaming their music online, licensing their content online, moving away from the traditional mediums while being ready to experiment. 

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