PRS for Music who are responsible for collecting and distributing royalties for music artists, have recorded a record year in 2012 despite some events been cancelled due to the Olympic Games. A total of £641.8 million was collected in royalties in 2012, an increase of 1.7 per cent from the previous year. But live music took the worst hit of 14.2 per cent down from £22.5 million in 2011 to £19.3 million last year.
The Rolling Stones will headline this year’s Glastonbury Festival
The reason for the drop in live royalties is being blamed on the London Olympic Games. Many live events that coincided with the Olympics were cancelled, with the most famous one being the Glastonbury Festival which returns this summer headlined by the Rolling Stones.
Pub and clubs remain the biggest earners for royalties with £35.5 million, but this fell by 2.2 per cent compared to 2011. This is mainly due to closures, due to economic pressure. Cinemas saw one of the largest growths in the public performance royalties with 7.1 per cent. This was due to music being used in cinemas and films and attendance being on the rise.
International royalties remained the biggest earner, but that also saw a drop of 4 per cent. This was mainly due to the poor exchange rate and also the tough economic times. But the biggest growth was in the online market. Digital royalties saw a whopping 32.2 per cent rise from £39.1 million to £51.7 million, which equates to 8 per cent of all royalties collected. Robert Ashcroft, Chief Executive of PRS for Music spoke of the important of online music services.
He said: “The ever-increasing importance of licensed online services such as iTunes and Spotify underlines the value of music to the internet economy.”
TV and radio saw an increase of 3.1 per cent, from £148.4 million in 2011 to £153 million last year. Radio remained pretty steady but with the renewal of TV licences for BBC Worldwide, MTV and Channel 4 an increase was achievable. Next year looks promising for this market as well with revenue expected from new platforms such as LOVEFiLM and Netflix.
Overall music royalties have remained pretty resilient and with online technologies advancing, those royalties are set to grow. The live royalties will hopefully return to pre-2012 levels as live events cancelled last year make a return.
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