The South African Music Rights Organisation (Samro) has embarked on a campaign to educate South African musicians about their rights to earn royalty payments from overseas performances or whenever their music is used.

 

Consequently, the organisation will be issuing out payments – under the Ascap Payment scheme – to musicians who have performed in the US between October 1 and September 30 last year.

 

But in order to do so more efficiently, Samro is calling out to local musicians to come forward with relevant information on the dates and venues of their previous performances overseas, along with the contact details of the promoter or venue organiser.

 

Samro spokesperson Sipho Dlamini said yesterday about the campaign: “We have found that South African music is travelling a lot more now than it used to.

 

“There are more performances being done on a regular basis and as an organisation we felt that it is necessary that our members are aware of their rights in this regard. “It is our duty to ensure that they receive what it is due to them.”

 

Ever since the campaign was launched late last year, the response from performing artists had been overwhelming.

 

“This communication process has allowed us to get more musicians informing us whenever they are travelling overseas, which is a great thing because this helps us to track their performances and ensure that we collect the money from various international collective societies.”

 

It is great news that South African musicians can receive more money for the work outside their borders, more so when they least expect it, he said.

 

“This is over and above what they get paid for by the promoters whenever they perform abroad. It means additional payments and this is great news for them.”

 

About how the process works, Dlamini further said: “When one of our local groups goes to London, for example, we would alert the UK’s Performing Right Society to ensure that the venue or the promoter there pays a fee for having their music performed.

 

“As an organisation we will then collect the money and distribute it to relevant musicians and groups, be it Freshlyground or The Parlotones,” said Dlamini, adding that although Samro is based in South Africa, it is able to represent anyone who’s making waves around the world.

 

Samro is an internationally affiliated music rights collection society that manages the music rights of its members.

 

Its job is to make sure that South African musicians, composers and authors of musical works enjoy the fruits of their labour by collecting royalties on their behalf whenever their music is used publicly, both locally and internationally.

 

Membership is free and once accepted, members receive royalties and benefits from their protected musical works for life.

 

In terms of international copyright law, anyone whose original musical work is performed abroad can enjoy what is known as performing rights – yet a lot of musicians who travel overseas continue to miss out on valuable additional income.

 

Samro’s Christine Reddy said: “We run ongoing workshops to help members understand how we go about collecting royalties from societies overseas and pass them on to the music creators, but more needs to be done to spread this message.”

 

Reddy was speaking in reference to various social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook, created for musicians to share their stories with friends and colleagues.

 

The good news, however, for those who have performed abroad recently, is that Samro can still collect royalties from last year’s performances.

 

To apply, visit http://www.samro.org.za before the closing date on January 15.