The Four Types of Royalties

Music royalties are payments generated by rights holders in exchange for the licensing of their music. Every song generates them in four ways:

• Performance Royalties — collected when your music plays in public: radio, TV, venues with music licenses, clubs, and streaming platforms.
• Sync Royalties — collected through sync licensing. Highly lucrative. Grants the right to use the copyright in TV, commercials, video games, and film.
• Print Music Royalties — paid to copyright holders for compositions printed as sheet music (most common in classical).
• Mechanical Royalties — paid to the songwriter every time a copy of the song is made: CDs, vinyl, downloads, streams.

The first concrete step in royalty collection is to sign up with a PRO — a Performance Rights Organization.