Big picture of the music business?

John1034

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I'm am doing a study on the overall body structure of the music business from the songwriter/artist's perspective and would appreciate some feedback from any experts, executives, college majors, etc. This is a very rough draft that I've put together in the last few days citing Passman's book and Wikipedia mostly. If you have knowledge of the industry please post any changes I should make and/or any major players I might have missed. I think I got most of them in there. I'm still trying to figure out where the unions fit in (SAG-AFTRA and AFM). I'm basing this off of the USA standard only, to start with.

Basically what I'm trying to do here is plot a person who is both songwriter and artist as the center of the universe. From their angle, I'm graphing the relationship between them and the rest of the players in the industry as the product moves from creator to consumer. Thank you all very much for your help.
 
I have made some modifications and added trade unions and trade associations. Could anyone tell me if this would be an ideal chart to give a small child? It is being made to brief him with a simple overview of the business, that is, from a successful US songwriter/artist's point of view.

The hierarcy is based on strength of relationship. For example: the lawyer drafts contracts between him and all the others, the manager oversees and advises him on all the others, and the business manager tracks finances between him and all the others. That is why these 3 are directly below him. Thanks again.

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Bump. Anyone?

---------- Post added 01-03-2013 at 12:09 PM ---------- Previous post was 01-01-2013 at 07:27 PM ----------

Echo... Echo... Echo...
 
Interesting and fairly organized, but not quite "it." A few things to consider-- You have the AFM and SAG/AFTRA listed around the artist, but many artists (if not _most_, at least coming into the business) are going to be "union-free;" also, SAG (Screen Actors Guild) is basically irrelevant other than for those double and triple-threat artists that are somehow involved in film... AFTRA is involved in music for singers (rather than instrumentalists), and for session work is generally the union that vocalists and voice-over artists belong to in ordeer to receive residuals from things like television and big market radio commercials. What is most important to songwriters would be either ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC, or their foreign affiliates, which you did not include at all, or an organization like Sound-Exchange.

The Producer/Label/Publisher dynamic is much more interconnected than your diagram indicates. Finally, the "digital age" has thrown a monkey wrench into this entire "structure" in that lots of people can now wear lots of hats, distribution and promotion are all over the map, and the "360 Deal" paradigm has consolidated (or at least centralized the out-sourcing of/to) many of the other functions such as agent/manager/business manager, etc., etc.

Go back and look more closely at Passman's book, and also check out Rachlin's "Encyclopedia of the Music Business;" that may help organize things for you a little more.

GJ
 
Finally... GJ man I've been looking for you on three different forums...

Interesting and fairly organized, but not quite "it." A few things to consider-- You have the AFM and SAG/AFTRA listed around the artist, but many artists (if not _most_, at least coming into the business) are going to be "union-free;"
True. Many probably wouldn't have a bus. manager as well but I'm modeling this after a successful artist in his prime

also, SAG (Screen Actors Guild) is basically irrelevant other than for those double and triple-threat artists that are somehow involved in film... AFTRA is involved in music for singers (rather than instrumentalists), and for session work is generally the union that vocalists and voice-over artists belong to in ordeer to receive residuals from things like television and big market radio commercials.
These guys just merged in 2012.

What is most important to songwriters would be either ASCAP, BMI, or SESAC, or their foreign affiliates, which you did not include at all, or an organization like Sound-Exchange.
I may be wrong... from what I remember in Passman's book the PROs go to the publishers and do not directly affiliate themselves with the writers, so I got them under the Publisher. Should I modify this?

The Producer/Label/Publisher dynamic is much more interconnected than your diagram indicates.
Woops I forgot to reconnect them, thanks. (Updated chart below. I think this would suffice, I don't know of any direct relations between the producer and publisher?)

Finally, the "digital age" has thrown a monkey wrench into this entire "structure" in that lots of people can now wear lots of hats, distribution and promotion are all over the map,
Do you mean like independent promotion? Where else is distribution, these rights aren't exclusive to the label/publisher?

and the "360 Deal" paradigm has consolidated (or at least centralized the out-sourcing of/to) many of the other functions such as agent/manager/business manager, etc., etc.
The 360 deals are new to me (and Passman's 8th edition), could you give an example of what you mean here...

Go back and look more closely at Passman's book, and also check out Rachlin's "Encyclopedia of the Music Business;" that may help organize things for you a little more.
I will definitely check that out
 
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Updated the chart... Inverted it like a tree, thought this might more accurately demonstrate the songwriter/artist's place of humility in the industry... interconnected the label with publisher and producer... added clubs to consumer sellers... made a few other modifications...

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