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Labels and publishers: All about record labels and music publishers

Record labels and music publishers

Even if you release your own records and downloads it helps to know how traditional major and independent labels work. The majors play a central role in mass media, distribution and retail. Traditional publishers can be useful for DIY writers, if only for royalty administration.

Performers and writers reached beyond theatre and music hall to a new mass market through publishing and recording. This made publishers and labels central to modern mainstream music.

Record companies and publishers dominated the music business in the 20th Century. At first, record companies controlled recording and sales by owning technology patents. After World War Two they lost their lead in recording technology and began competing with each other for popular artists and popular songs. They switched to industry standard recording media which enabled the growth of independent record labels.

A&R men (Artists and Repertoire) working for record companies matched artists with repertoire from music publishers. Eventually the record companies outsourced recording technology entirely. Now, labels and publishers still dominate the music industry but they are simply two service suppliers to the artist, among many others.


A record company is a business which deals in recordings (e.g. EMI). A record label is a unit within the company which handles a particular catalogue or repertoire (e.g. Blue Note). A label can specialise in a genre or country, or sometimes just the project of a particular label head. A single record company can run many labels. In practice the terms record company and label are often used loosely to mean the same thing.


Publishers originally sold printed music but ended up dealing mainly in the publishing copyright. Record labels still sell significant numbers of records but increasingly rely on the recording copyright.

Record labels

Record companies originally made and sold recordings—today their business is based on recording copyrights. They are no longer in the business of making records themselves.

Licensing recordings for release

We normally expect to see CDs on the same label that signed the artist but it isn’t always that simple. Record labels frequently grant exclusive or non-exclusive licenses to other labels in their own territory or other territories. This means an artist signed by one label can appear on another. An artist on a major label in one territory might even appear on an independent label elsewhere.

The majors and indies

Record labels fall roughly into two groups: the majors and independents. These figures don’t change much from year to year.

Record sales figures usually come from the RIAA (USA), BPI (UK), OCC (UK) or other official bodies—these are IFPI figures. These numbers often exclude DIY and indie releases that bypass mainstream distribution and retail channels (e.g. CDs sold at gigs or from unsigned artist web sites). For example, these are the 2008 figures from Neilsen SoundScan in the USA.

Although these figures suggest independent sales are lower, SoundScan only records barcoded retail and there is far less independent distribution in the USA. (EMI does have a lower market share than WMG in the USA.)

The major record labels

Major record labels have the largest catalogues of recording rights (by historical mergers and acquisition of independent labels). Most of them have publishing companies and all control distribution and new media interests.

The majors make less than 1 in 5 of all controlled releases, and sell about 70% of recorded music worldwide. The rest is sold by the independents.

Within each major record company, label groups and names are frequently reorganised. Current names are mothballed, old names are resurrected and labels are re-grouped, so this doesn’t show up-to-date company structure or a complete list of imprints. As the number of majors gets smaller the number of imprints they operate is increasing and they will buy and buy into more indie labels.

Some company details:

•Universal Music Group Subsidiary of Vivendi Universal (public company) Chairman: Doug Morris
•Sony BMG Music Entertainment Subsidiary of Sony (public company) Chairman: Andy Lack
•EMI Group Owned by private equity firm Terra Firma Chairman: John Gildersleeve (Guy Hands runs Terra Firma)
•Warner Music Group Public company Chairman: Edgar Bronfman


The major record labels don’t stay the same for long. Here are some recent developments:

•Sony bought the other half of Sony BMG from partner Bertelsmann for $900 million on 5 August 2008.
•The Sony BMG joint venture was initially cleared by the EU in July 2004. It was reviewed and finally cleared in October 2007.
•EMI and WMG each made a bid for the other in 2006. EMI was then subject of an unsuccessful buy-out by Permira, followed by a successful buyout by Terra Firma in August 2007 for £2.4 billion. The major labels don’t manufacture significant numbers of CDs in-house.
•Time/Warner sold their CD manufacturing to Cinram in 2004.
•EMI/Warner sold their Australian manufacturing to Summit in 2004.
•Universal sold their USA and EU manufacturing to Gleanayre in 2005.
•Sony manufacturing (DADC) was always separate to Sony Music.
•EMI retains manufacturing in Canada, and in Japan with Toshiba.


Major record companies aren’t exactly the same—their earnings break down differently depending on their market activities. Here’s the BMG picture spanning the start of their joint venture with Sony Music Group in 2004.

About 320 majors and large indies make up the membership of the BPI (founded 1973).

Independent record labels

Independents rarely include publishing or manufacturing. They occasionally run distribution and frequently have new media operations.

The indies make 4 out of 5 controlled releases, and sell about 30% of recorded music worldwide.

There are several thousand independents in the UK alone—they are simply record labels that don’t qualify to be called majors. Some indies specialise in licensing existing recordings but most deal with their own content and artists.

The bigger indies normally use major label distribution, and majors sometimes own shares or invest in indies. This doesn’t necessarily reduce a record label’s independence.

About 850 indies make up the membership of AIM (founded in 1998).

Record labels and other bodies

There are many music industry trade organisations and other professional bodies representing and working for record labels.

The two main UK record label trade organisations are the BPI who represent the major labels and AIM who represent independents. Both are represented outside the UK by IFPI the international record industry trade body. In Europe AIM are represented by Impala, and worldwide by WIN and their licensing body Merlin.

The BPI are the main sponsors of the OCC, PPL and VPL although these organisations are used by AIM members and members of neither.

There is a retail trade affiliation between the OCC and ERA (which used to be called BARD), and a performance affiliation between PPL, Equity, the MPG and MU called the Joint Performers Organisation (JPO).

UK Music—the replacement for British Music Rights (BMR)—now represents many of these organisations alongside publishing bodies and the MMF.

Music publishers

Publishing companies originally printed and sold sheet music—today their business is based on publishing royalties. Publishing and copyright began with printing and now includes digital copies.

The main role of a modern publisher is collecting royalties from national royalty systems across the world on behalf of writers (and themselves). Publishing today normally means the release of a recording rather than sheet music, and music publishers do little traditional paper publishing.

Publishing consists of two main activities:

•collecting license fees from commercial venues and broadcasters, foreign royalty organisations and from sync licenses, sheet music etc.;
•pitching material to potential users to maximise earnings for the publisher and writer(s).

The first is generally called administration and the second is a full publishing service.
About 200 corporate members representing 3,000 publishers, and 40,000 writers make up the membership of MPA (founded 1881).


Different kinds of music publishers

Music publishers are not generally called majors and indies although all the major record labels have big music publishing sister companies. EMI and WMG own the largest publishing catalogues.

The copyright numbers given for the big publishers are fairly conservative. Sony is the odd one out in this group—it’s a loose collection of catalogues which is no bigger than the largest independent publishers.

The other main category of music publishing is library, production and film music.
Here’s a list of UK library music publishers from the Regional Film and Video site.

Music publishers and other bodies

There are many music industry trade organisations and other professional bodies representing and working for music publishers.

The main UK publishing organisation is the MPA which sponsors publishing royalty collectors MCPS and PRS who work together as MCPS-PRS Alliance. The MPA is represented in Europe by GESAC and globally by CISAC.

The MPA and PRS supported the formation of BACS.

UK Music—the replacement for British Music Rights (BMR)—now represents many of these organisations alongside record label bodies and the MMF.

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