Performance royalties are payments owed to the songwriter and publisher of a musical composition every time that composition is played publicly, whether on radio, on a streaming service, at a live show, or over the speakers in a store or restaurant. Federal copyright law gives the owner of a composition the exclusive right to perform it publicly, and that right is what turns a play into a payment. Collecting the money means signing up with the right organizations, registering each song, and reporting the plays that don’t get tracked automatically.
What Counts as a Public Performance
A public performance is any use of music that reaches an audience beyond a normal circle of family and friends. Terrestrial AM/FM radio, television, and digital streaming are the obvious ones. The definition also covers live concerts and festivals, along with everyday commercial settings like a restaurant playlist, a gym’s background music, or a hotel lobby soundtrack. Each of those plays generates a royalty for the writer and publisher behind the composition.
Most businesses cover this by paying a performing rights organization for a blanket license, which gives them access to a huge catalog without negotiating song by song. ASCAP describes its blanket license as covering more than 10 million works. The license fees the businesses pay are the pool your royalties come out of.
Who Actually Gets Paid
Performance royalties go to the people behind the composition, meaning the melody and lyrics, not to the performers you hear on the recording. The composition and the sound recording are two separate copyrights, and they generate different royalty streams collected by different organizations. Missing that distinction is the single most common reason artists leave money uncollected.
On the composition side, the money splits into two equal halves: a writer share and a publisher share. ASCAP pays 50% to the songwriter and 50% to the publisher for every tracked performance.1ASCAP. Splitsville BMI uses the same structure.2BMI. How Does BMI Split Royalties Between Songwriters/Composers and Publishers? If you write your own material and haven’t signed a publishing deal, you can register as both writer and publisher and collect both halves.
A quirk of U.S. law surprises many artists: terrestrial AM/FM radio pays the songwriter and publisher for the composition, but pays nothing to the performer or label for the sound recording. That exemption is written directly into the statute.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 17 USC 114 – Scope of Exclusive Rights in Sound Recordings Digital radio works differently, and that’s where SoundExchange comes in later.
Sign Up With a Performing Rights Organization
To collect composition royalties in the U.S., you have to affiliate with a Performing Rights Organization, or PRO. The main options are ASCAP, BMI, and SESAC. A smaller fourth organization, Global Music Rights, licenses compositions but represents a limited roster. You can only belong to one PRO at a time.
ASCAP and BMI are both open to anyone. ASCAP is free for writers and charges a one-time $50 processing fee for publisher membership, waived if you register as writer and publisher at the same time.4ASCAP. Music Creators BMI is free for songwriters; publisher registration costs $150 for individuals and $250 for companies.5BMI. What Is the Fee to Join as a Songwriter or Composer? SESAC is invitation-only and doesn’t accept unsolicited applications; the usual route in is through a manager, attorney, or agent.6SESAC. SESAC
Contract length differs. ASCAP writer contracts run one year at a time. BMI locks in for two. SESAC’s smaller roster means more personalized handling and faster payment turnaround, sometimes within 90 days after a performance quarter ends. For most independent songwriters starting out, the real choice is ASCAP or BMI.
Register Each Song
Joining a PRO gets you in the door. Registering each individual song is what starts the tracking. Before you open the registration portal, pull together:
- The writer split for every contributor, agreed on in writing, totaling 100% of the writer share.
- The Interested Parties Information (IPI) number for each writer and publisher. This is a unique 9-to-11-digit identifier that ties you to the global rights database, and you receive yours when you join a PRO. Get your co-writers’ IPI numbers before you register or payments can be delayed or misattributed.7ASCAP. All About IPI Numbers
- The song title plus any alternate titles, working titles, or subtitle variations, so the system can match performances accurately.
- Any publishing company names, each with its own IPI number.
If a co-writer belongs to a different PRO, you still register the song with your own PRO. Each organization independently tracks its own members’ shares.8ASCAP. Registering Your Music Once submitted, the song enters the repertoire and becomes eligible for royalty tracking.
Report Your Live Performances Yourself
Radio and streaming plays get tracked automatically through logs and digital fingerprinting. Live shows don’t. If you play your own songs at a venue, the PRO has no way of knowing unless you tell them. Skipping this is one of the most common ways songwriters lose income. Fifty unreported shows a year is fifty shows’ worth of royalties gone.
ASCAP’s OnStage program lets you submit setlists through your Member Access account. You enter the date, venue, and songs performed, and ASCAP pays based on the license fee that venue pays, so bigger venues generate bigger payments. The venue must hold an ASCAP license, and you must have direct deposit set up before submitting. Claims run on quarterly deadlines: a January-through-March show must be reported by June 30, April through June by September 30, and so on.9ASCAP. ASCAP OnStage Only one co-writer needs to submit for every writer and publisher on the registration to get paid.
BMI Live works the same way. You log in to BMI Online Services or the BMI mobile app, enter the date, time, venue, and setlist, and BMI verifies and pays. You can report performances from up to six months prior, and payouts are quarterly. Only the performing songwriter can submit, though publishers are still eligible to be paid on the entries. Direct deposit is required.10BMI. BMI Live
Register With SoundExchange for the Recording Side
Everything above is the composition. A separate royalty stream exists for the sound recording itself, but only for digital transmissions. When a non-interactive digital service like satellite radio or internet radio plays a track, the sound recording copyright owner and the featured performer are both owed royalties. SoundExchange is the only U.S. organization authorized to collect and distribute these statutory royalties.
The split is set by federal law: 50% to the sound recording copyright owner (usually the label), 45% directly to the featured artist, and 5% split between funds administered by the American Federation of Musicians and SAG-AFTRA for non-featured session musicians and vocalists.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 17 USC 114 – Scope of Exclusive Rights in Sound Recordings The 45% direct-to-artist share bypasses the label entirely.
Registration with SoundExchange is free.11SoundExchange. How Much Does It Cost to Register? If you both wrote and performed a song, you should be signed up with a PRO for the composition royalties and with SoundExchange for the sound recording royalties. One doesn’t cover the other. SoundExchange does not collect for visual media like YouTube or Vevo, and does not cover interactive services like Spotify or Apple Music, which negotiate directly with labels and distributors.12SoundExchange. Frequently Asked Questions
When the Money Actually Arrives
Once your songs are registered, your PRO matches performance data against its database and calculates what you’re owed. Terrestrial radio stations submit airplay logs, digital services report streams, and television broadcasters provide cue sheets listing music used in each program.
Expect a lag between performance and payment. ASCAP’s distribution schedule shows a typical delay of six to nine months. A song played in April through June of 2025, for example, would appear on a writer distribution in January 2026.13ASCAP. ASCAP Distribution Schedule The lag exists because the PRO has to collect license fees from businesses and process the performance data first. BMI runs on a similar timeline.
Payments come by direct deposit. If you have a publisher, the writer and publisher shares are sent separately; the publisher’s half goes straight to the publisher, not through you. Your member dashboard shows earnings, performance history, and payment details. Outdated banking or contact information is a common reason payments stall, so keep it current.
Royalties From Outside the U.S.
If your music plays overseas, you’re still owed royalties. U.S. PROs collect them through reciprocal agreements with performing rights societies in other countries.14BMI. Agreements with Foreign Performing Rights Organizations A play on German radio, for instance, is collected by the German society and forwarded through your U.S. PRO to you.
Many countries withhold a portion of royalties for local taxes before forwarding the rest. ASCAP grosses up the royalties it reports on your Form 1099 to include those withheld amounts, which lets you claim a foreign tax credit on your U.S. return. ASCAP provides an International Distribution Summary with country-by-country breakdowns of foreign earnings and taxes withheld, which is the data you need to complete IRS Form 1116.15ASCAP. International Royalties Tax Reporting Guide Without that credit, the same income can effectively be taxed twice.
What You’ll Owe in Taxes
How your royalties are taxed depends on whether you’re actively working as a songwriter or passively receiving payments, such as from an inherited catalog. Active writers, performers, and promoters report royalties as self-employment income on Schedule C. Someone with no ongoing involvement in the music business reports the income on Schedule E.16Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Schedule E (Form 1040)
Schedule C brings real costs. Self-employment income is subject to Social Security tax at 12.4% on net earnings up to $184,500 in 2026, plus Medicare tax at 2.9% on all net earnings with no cap.17Social Security Administration. Contribution and Benefit Base An additional 0.9% Medicare surtax applies on self-employment income above $200,000 for single filers and $250,000 for married filing jointly. On the other side, you can deduct half of your self-employment tax as an above-the-line adjustment on Form 1040, and you can deduct legitimate business expenses like studio time, equipment, and travel to gigs against your royalty income.
One detail catches a lot of writers off guard: the IRS reporting threshold for royalties is $10, not the $600 that applies to most other 1099 income. Your PRO is required to issue a Form 1099-MISC if it pays you $10 or more in royalties during the year.18Internal Revenue Service. Instructions for Forms 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC You owe tax on all royalty income whether or not you receive a 1099, but that low threshold means even small earnings get reported.