Commercial audio acquisition
 

Hello all,
I'm taking my first step into creating an advert for TV, regional mind you, but nevertheless new territory! We're looking to use a commercial music track, but I haven't the slightest idea where to start looking to get permissions and of course fees.
I'm sure the first step is to decide what track to use, however, we haven't got there yet, I'd really just like some advice on how to proceed and things to look out for so I can start researching. Any help would be gratefully received,

Thank You,

Ryan Stone

If I understand your question, you are looking for a source of commercial music...google "royalty free music" and you'll find a plethora of vendors of "buyout" tracks...i.e., music you can pay for once and re-use as you see fit thereafter. Most sites have free previews.

We have bought from Royaltyfreemusic.com and DAWN.com, you can download the tracks and pay for them over the internet or buy CD's. A few of the MANY other providers: freeplaymusic.com, firstcom.com, musicmediatracks.com, productiontrax.com and soundsnap.com. Again, note this isn't FREE music, is BUYOUT music that you only have to pay for once, unlike traditional ASCAP and BMC arrangements where you have to pay every time you do anything with it....the quality varies, from humdrum midi tracks to orchestrial tours de force, so you need to define the genre you are looking for and listen to a lot of samples.../ hth/ Battle Vaughan/miamiherald.com video team

Try DigitalJuice.com. Check their StackTraxx selections. Cover a wide variety, and are relatively inexpensive. Full previews there.

Smartsounds has a decent library of royalty free music to go along with their SonicFire Pro software. Another source of tracks with reasonale licensing fees is Magnatunes.com. A major supplier of production music is the DeWolfe library, www.dewolfemusic.com. by "commercial music" you mean a current music release, you need to track down the info on the composer and publisher who own the music and can grant sync licenses plus the record label owning the recording who can grant master use licenses.

Hey everyone,
Thanks for your responses, however, I was afraid I didn't make the question clear. I've been using royalty free music for some time now, that's all sorted. I'm now talking about record label music, signed bands and artists, chart-topping hits etc
Was wondering if anyone had experience acquiring that type of music?

Edit: Sorry Steve, I noticed you briefly addressed my issue at the end. Thank You, I'll look into those things. Any other help would be appreciated.

Ryan

music
 

Get a good banker. Current commercial music is not gonna be cheap. youre better off finding a sound alike in the buy-out music .

For that sort of music you can go directly to the publisher and record labels - the ASCAP database is a good source for info as to who owns what while the recording copyright can be found on the CD you're using. But you might find a better option is to hire a music rights clearance agency to handle the legwork and negotiations for you. They charge a fee but you may find its a small price to pay to avoid the headaches yourself. A google on the term will turn up a bunch

Thanks everyone, I shall look into it. I'll also look into the soundalikes.

Thanks,

Ry

BZ rights and Harry Fox Agency are two well-known shops. I've talked to both over the years.

Pretty easy and not always expensive.

Try this: HFA’s Songfile &reg

Regards,

Ty Ford