Songwriting & Music Publishing

Music Publishing News Weekly Roundup May 9th, 2014: Rap Genius, SESAC, Downtown & More

RapgeniusThe NMPA has partnered with Rap Genius after months of legal controversy. Founded in 2009,  Rap Genius has been getting major attention as it allows artists and fans to analyze lyric annotations and communicate in online forums. Up until now, the site has been in violation of copyright law by using unlicensed song lyrics. The NMPA sent take-down notices to Rap Genius as well as 50 other rising websites with similar unlicensed content. As of May 6th, the two parties have reached an agreement and will work together to allow the publishers under the NMPA to legally license their song lyrics to Rap Genius.

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The 18th Annual SESAC Pop Awards were held on Monday, May 6th at The New York Public Library. The invitation only US Performing Rights Organization spent the night celebrating their highest charting Pop songs in 2013. Charlie XCX, writer of Icona Pop’s hit “I love It” received the award for Songwriter of The Year and Song Of The Year. Performance highlights included American Authors performing their recent hit “Best Day Of My Life” and previous Songwriter Of The year, Rico Love who performed new single “They don't Know”. This year’s visionary award went to Richard Gottenhrer, a veteran songwriter and co-founder of major digital distribution service The Orchard.

Downtown Music Publishing has renewed their deal with Neon Trees. The NYC based music publishing company has chosen to continue its Co-Publishing agreement originally inked in 2008. The band’s most recent album “Pop Psychology” was released April 22, 2014 via Mercury Records and debuted at No. 6 on Billboard.  

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