Music law

A song is created once but exploited many times: it is recorded, published, licensed for a series or a commercial, streamed on digital platforms, performed live and, today, it may even end up training an artificial intelligence system. Each use is a separate right, and each right is an opportunity —or a risk— that is best resolved before the work starts to play. We advise artists, songwriters, labels and publishers on every legal decision in their career or catalog, from the first contract to the defense of their rights.

Services

• Negotiation and drafting of management and artist representation agreements.
• Record, video and music production agreements with labels, studios and production companies.
• Distribution, broadcast and synchronization licenses for music in film, series, advertising and video games.
• Songwriter, composer and performer agreements.
• Registration of musical works and relations with collective management organizations: SADAIC, ASCAP, BMI and SGAE, among others.
• Setting up and structuring music publishers and record labels, owned or third-party.
• Legal strategy regarding the training of artificial intelligence models on musical works and AI-generated content.

Catalog acquisitions, sales and due diligence

A music catalog —an artist’s, a label’s or a publisher’s— is an asset. Before buying, selling or valuing it, you need to know exactly who the real owner of each right is, whether those rights can be transferred, whether any contractual terms could hold up the deal and what royalties it generates. The due diligence covers:

• Who holds the rights to each composition and each recording, and whether they are available for sale or assignment.
• The conditions for the sale: approvals, rights of first refusal or outstanding obligations.
• Who collects the royalties today and in what share, and whether that matches what was agreed.
• Which sources generate income and which are not being exploited or collected.

It is designed for buyers —labels, publishers and investment companies— who need to know what they are acquiring, and for artists, labels and publishers who want to sell or value their catalog. The work has three stages: mapping the chain of title, work by work; analyzing the agreements and how royalties are currently shared; and a findings report with risks, opportunities and concrete recommendations.

Catalog clean-up

Many artists who grew very fast, or who worked for years without much formality, now have catalogs with incomplete agreements, rights that were never properly assigned or clauses that outright prevent a sale. Before selling, the catalog has to be put in order. What we find most often:

• Incomplete or improperly assigned rights: verbal, expired or poorly drafted agreements that cast doubt on who owns each work.
• Clauses that prevent a sale: prohibitions, rights of first refusal or outstanding obligations in management, label or publishing agreements.
• Royalties that are misallocated or cannot be collected, due to missing registrations, outdated agreements or informal management.

We identify which rights are missing or improperly assigned, obtain and negotiate the necessary assignments and approvals, and leave the documentation and ownership ready to be transferred.

Royalty audits

You don’t need to sell a catalog to need to understand it. Many artists, labels and publishers have been collecting royalties for years without knowing for sure whether they receive everything they are owed. The full review covers:

• The catalog inventory: which works and recordings exist, where they are released and since when they generate rights.
• Statement reconciliation: what digital distributors report versus what SADAIC and AADI-CAPIF pay out.
• Unclaimed publishing rights: works without an active publisher often leave a significant share of publishing income uncollected.
• Neighboring rights from radio, television and public performance, which are often not claimed systematically.
• Owned channels: monetization on YouTube and social media, and securing ownership of those accounts.
• Current distribution agreements: term, exclusivity and termination conditions.

The result is a clear, actionable report: what is being collected today, what is not, and a concrete plan to capture the income owed before licensing, selling or continuing to exploit the catalog.