Performance royalties are collected from traditional radio stations in nearly all major industrialized countries, but U.S. musicians and record companies can't because there is no similar royalty on the books here.
"The time comes that we really have to do this," said John Simson, executive director of SoundExchange, a group created by the recording industry to collect and distribute Internet and satellite music royalties.
For record labels and musicians, addressing the issue now is crucial because digital radio, now being rolled out, allows broadcasters to split a signal into several digital channels and play even more music exempt from performance royalties.
Groups preparing to push Congress to change the law include the RIAA, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, the American Federation of Musicians and other organizations. The U.S. Copyright Office has long supported removing the exemption.
The groups have a major ally in Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Valley Village), who now chairs the House subcommittee dealing with intellectual property law. Berman is "actively contemplating" leading a legislative push to end the exemption.
"Given the many different ways to promote music now that didn't exist as effectively when this original exemption was made," he said, "the logic of that I think is more dubious."
Congress granted composers and publishers of music copyright protection in 1909. But the recording and radio industries were in their infancy, and the actual musical recordings were not covered. Congress extended limited copyright protection to musical performances in the 1970s to guard against an earlier form of piracy: the copying of records and tapes.
But by then, broadcasters were influential enough to snuff out any talk of making them pay musicians and recording companies for playing their music.
"The old saying is the reason broadcasters don't pay a performance royalty is there's a radio station in every congressional district and a record company in three," said Chris Castle, a music industry lawyer.
Broadcasters even successfully fought a group of singers and musicians led by Frank Sinatra in the late 1980s who tried to pressure Congress into changing the law. Broadcasters also prevailed in 1995, when Congress exempted them from new fees for digital recordings that everyone else had to pay.
"Congress has always recognized that broadcasters generate enormous sums of revenue to record companies and artists in terms of airplay," said NAB Executive Vice President Dennis Wharton. Radio stations also have public-interest obligations that satellite and Internet broadcasters don't have to worry about, he said.
Satellite radio, Internet broadcasters and cable television companies offering digital music channels now pay performance royalties. The recording industry and musician groups say it's time for traditional radio stations to pony up.
"Most of the artists in the world are kind of middle-class cats, trying to piece together a living," said Jonatha Brooke, a singer-songwriter who is part of the Recording Artists Coalition advocacy group. "It's important to be recognized and paid for our work."
jim.puzzanghera@latimes.com
