"What Is A Contract Period and How Does It Affect Your Music Recording Contract?"
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Music Publishers |
One part of getting a music recording contract is how often your will record new music. In this article we will look at how a record contract works in terms of your responsibilities to record it.
You earn your money on a recording contract through royalties on the sales of your records. This all starts by recording your music. Your contract will be structured to have contract periods.
Each new record will contain a single or singles that will be promoted via radio, the internet, and other forms of promotion. Your record contract will state what the contract periods are. You are given an advance in your contract that states the deadline to complete your record.
Depending on the length of your deal, specified in your music recording contract, you will have contract recording periods to complete each record. Your first contract period is the amount of time to complete record one, the second period is the amount of time you have to complete record number two and so forth.
As a new artist this is all very exciting and presents very few problems. All artists want to control the quality of their music, but initially this is not a problem. You probably have a back log of music to work on anyway.
To get your first record done within the first contract period you go in and start recording. Once your record is complete the label now owns it. Depending on the contract you signed they own the rights for up to 10 years and you can not re-record any of the songs on it. This is know as the lock-out clause and could be as short as 5 years.
If the label is not happy with the record you will be required to go in and re-do parts or all of it. You are still operating under the contract period to complete your record on time.
The music your record that is not released is still owned by the label for the length of the lock out period. They may release it at a later date, or never release it at all.
Understanding how the music recording contract period and lock out clause works is important as it determines everything you do for the label and the control over your own songs.
Many new artists do not concern themselves with these things because they just want to record their music. That is o.k. Just be aware that you are giving up the rights to your songs for a period of time.
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Brian Cook is a freelance writer whose articles on music and songwriting have appeared on many websites.
You can find more of these at SongwritersGuide.com.
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