RIAA

In the Music industry an important thing that you, as a music professional, need to figure out is what industry niche you fit into. Once you have figured that out you will then be able to network with other professionals in your field and start to build relationships, which is very important in all industries. I will address below one of the biggest, if not, the biggest association in the recording industry, the Recording Industry Association of America “RIAA".

RIAA, is a trade organization that supports and promotes the creative and financial vitality of the major music companies. Companies that are members of the RIAA create, manufacture and/or distribute approximately 85% of legitimate recorded music produced and sold in the United States. That means that on estimate only 15% of music produced and sold in the Unites States comes from independent acts. Due to RIAA’s vast member catalog I will not try to name all the members, but here are a few members of RIAA, Akon/Konvict Live, American/Warner Bros, Atlantic, Universal Music and the list goes on. On RIAA’s site there is a tab for you to select to become a member. They do not offer individual memberships so you would have to apply for membership through your company or record label, which requires you to fill out a selection of forms and for you to prove that you have products already in, or ready to enter, the distribution stage. If you are approved you will be sent an approval letter. I think that this is amazing that independent or smaller scale labels and companies can become part of the RIAA and that it is not just limited to the bigger multi-million dollar labels.

         

The RIAA offers different services, both to members and non-members. They talk about the two types of licensing on their site: Voluntary and Statutory. Voluntary licensing is when you have permission from the copyright holder to use their work and Statutory licensing are licenses given from the government in certain situations. The RIAA also offer Global Release Identifier (“Grid”), which is used to identify a release of music over electronic networks and also Digital Data Exchange (“DDEX”), which specifies electronic messages relating to trade in music.

        

The term ‘network’ is often thrown around at times in reference to young entrepreneurs and aspiring industry professionals. Networking is very important in an industry as ours because often times it is not what you can do that gets you the job, but more importantly who you know. The RIAA is the biggest association in the recording industry and becoming a member of an organization that owns 85% of the music trade would most definitely open doors in the business and provide valuable connections with other members of RIAA.