Who does a song belong to..

Hindi music these days largely refers to Hindi film music...Indian classical music has been relegated to to being teh music for a very nice audience...folk doesnt seem to have a mass global appeal and private pop albums havent been teh talk of the the town for some time now...Music directors, lyricisits and singers are the ones who create a song...but the song is created for a film...so who is the owner of the song...the producer or the artisits who created it... a topic worth debating...

Hiya.....🤗

Originally posted by: SLV3

Hiya.....🤗

Excellent topic.

I feel it belongs to musicians as whatever the lyrics are ....it all depends on the tune and rythym of the song that captures everyones attention....we may not remember the lyrics yet we will still be able to hum the song tune...

Rohini

Hiya to u too, Ro!😊

heyyyy

Do musicians get any share of the profit when a movie becomes hit? No.
Infact many a times its the music of the film which lures the audience into cinema halls.

I had sent a tweet to Vishal Dadlani asking his take on this issue.
He replied saying, "my take is simple. All creators must have royalty stakes in their work. It'll lead to better music."

Originally posted by: brahmabul

Do musicians get any share of the profit when a movie becomes hit? No.
Infact many a times its the music of the film which lures the audience into cinema halls.

I had sent a tweet to Vishal Dadlani asking his take on this issue.
He replied saying, "my take is simple. All creators must have royalty stakes in their work. It'll lead to better music."

True....

A song belongs to the composer and lyricist and producer.

I think it belongs a little bit to EVERYONE that is part of the song. You just can't take the credit away from any one of them. That includes lyricist, musicaians, song composer, producer, and singers!

My views are slightly different...a completed "film" song should definitely belong to the Producer. A lyricist, Music composer or the artists ( both on screen & behind the screen) cannot stake claim to a song. Yes they can stake claim to it's popularity but it's ownership should be with the producer. My reason is simple , it's the producer who has collected all these people together to make the song, he has put in the much needed finance and he is generally the one who nurtures the song from the initial stages to it's completion and beyond!

Typically a record label owns the song. The record label actually produces the song, publishes and releases it. That is why not just in India, in most countries the record label owns the song. The singers, composers and others involved in the song - get royalties or set fees.

This issue is one of the biggest crux in the whole music piracy debates. DRM and other anti-piracy laws are not there to protect musicians and real artistes - but greedy record labels. The actual musician really gets a very low cut and its nowhere close to being a fair share.

Hence there is a shift to smaller private labels that fairly produce records and equitably distribute the copyright benefits and profits. Musicians intentionally publish copyright free music on their fan pages etc - so that they and their team earn fair share from merchandise sales, concerts etc and no one unfairly mints money of their creativity.

There have been several attempts to change copyright laws, but its a long ways WIP. In India with the mass commercialization and hierarchical structure of the industry the hope of successful niche labels is distant and bleak. But hopefully it will get there soon.

Edit to add: Since the song recording process involves so many people from composers, singers, recording engineers, publishers, the video front etc - it is hard to pick one person or group for the song to belong too. The best way is for an entity to gain copyright and all involved parties to sign off on proportional royalties.