When did you last fill in your setlist and hand it in at the venue? Did they ever get round to sending it off? Could they read your handwriting? Was the title exactly correct? Did you get paid? Every time you play a show you should be getting paid by your Performing Rights Organisation. In the UK, that’s PRS. Even the smallest venue pays £9 for a show and that is distributed among the acts that play. Often, you’ll be the only one claiming that and it all adds up over a year. In the biggest venues, the rewards can be huge — we’d love to tell you exact amounts but there’s a lot of variables. See the PRS website for more info.
Once you send off your set you can post it to social media so your fans can see what you played; and new fans can see what that third song was tonight that they loved and buy it with the embedded link. We strongly recommend that you fill in the buy links when you first set up your app — we don’t take a penny of that.
You can also copy in your manager, publisher or label if you have one, so they can see how hard you’re working and keep track of where you’re playing. And your publisher can chase up any unpaid royalties for you. Win/Win!
We just take a fixed 10p per set, which even for the smallest payout is around just 1% — and it all goes to paying the costs to keep the app running. And don’t forget — we give the maximum we can, 50% (well, 49.9%) of all profit back to the non profit organisation who thought up and built this for you, Karousel Music. This will help them to change conditions for great artists of all ages, and give grants to some great songwriters and musicians who need a little help surviving and thriving. We can all survive and keep making music if we all pull together and get organised. This will also help PRO’s like PRS see where there are venues not paying for a license — that will mean more money in the pot for you guys. Spread the word. Who says us artists aren’t on it?
This is the number you were given by your Performing Rights Organisation. In the UK, that’s PRS, who call it a CAE number. You need to be a member of a PRO to get paid for the live performance of your songs - most artists join in their home territory but you can also join an overseas organisation instead if you prefer. In the case of PRS that's currently £50 - well worth it. Get those songs registered if you're serious about a career in music, and get paid to play.
