{"id":862741,"date":"2026-06-12T18:13:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T18:13:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/862741\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T18:13:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T18:13:18","slug":"indie-venues-call-for-dismantling-the-pros-blanket-licensing-practice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/862741\/","title":{"rendered":"Indie Venues Call For \u2018Dismantling\u2019\u00a0the PRO’s Blanket Licensing Practice"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tCity Winery owner Michael Dorf<\/strong> said he gets letters all the time from performing rights organizations (PROs) like BMI, SESAC and AllTrack when he pushes back on the blanket licensing practice that requires live music venues \u2014 as well as other businesses that play music \u2014 to pay a set fee for the songs being played in their establishments. The money collected from the businesses goes to the PROs, that then distribute the funds to the songwriters they represent.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut Dorf, who also owns Michael Dorf Presents and founded the original Knitting Factory venue in New York, said these letters are in response to him asking the individual PROs to specify what songs of theirs were played on his stage. The letter in hand from AllTrack, Dorf explained from the annual National Independent Venue Alliance conference in Minneapolis earlier this week, threatened fines of up to $150,000 per track used if he does not obtain the appropriate license.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tRelated\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"NIVA<\/p>\n

\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis is mafioso, thug-like practices,\u201d Dorf tells the room of independent venue owners, promoters, talent agents and more during the PROs, Policy, and the Live Music Economy panel at NIVA\u201926. \u201cThis is an outdated law, and it\u2019s being abused. It\u2019s making everyone nervous that they are going to get sued.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMy question would be, is it the law itself that is the problem or is it the way the PROs are leveraging it?\u201d said Ella Yates<\/strong>, senior adviser to the House Judiciary Committee at the conference. Yates started her career in Congress in 2016 working for then-Congressman Doug Collins<\/strong> during the Music Modernization Act negotiations. \u201cBecause they\u2019re suggesting you can\u2019t go work by work. \u2018You have to get this blanket license. Sorry, deal with it.\u2019 And that\u2019s not really a federal law. That\u2019s just a business practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe panel \u2014 moderated by xBK Live venue owner and Tour Tech co-founder Tobi Parks<\/strong> \u2014 was set to discuss the concerns independent venues are having with the practice of blanket licensing used by PROs in the U.S. and how that bloating cost is hurting both the artists and the venues they tour in. The topic was a looming concern for NIVA members attending the conference from June 7-10 throughout independent venues in the city.<\/p>\n

\n\tNathaniel Marro<\/strong>, executive director of the National Independent Talent Organization (NITO), told the audience that he believes PROs work for 85% to 90% of what artists need to get paid for the use of their work, but that the blanket licensing practice seems like \u201ca very serious hole in the bucket.\u201d Depending on the show deal, the PRO fees can be coming out of the artist\u2019s pocket. Marro explained that NITO conducted studies in 2025 that found that some artists were paying upward of $15,000 on tour to PROs and receiving just $26 back for playing their own works.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWhen we talk about the blanket licensing model and what PROs have to do, their job is immense,\u201d said Parks. \u201cThey have to license everything from the local laundromat to the movie theater, to the radio stations, to all of our venues, and figuring out how to collect all of those royalties to make sure that songwriters get compensated \u2014 which is what we all want to have happen \u2014 is an enormous task.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the U.S., a PRO blanket license for a live music venue works to ideally cover the use of any work being played or performed at a show. Artists can be signed up to a handful of PROs including SESAC, BMI, ASCAP and Global Music Rights, which collect a percentage of the event\u2019s ticket sales or capacity. Each PRO then uses those funds to pay songwriters for the use of their work. Under the blanket license, each PRO gets paid their percentage, regardless if any of the works played at that event are registered with their organization. If the event provides a setlist, whichever PRO represents those artists will log that information and pay the songwriters accordingly. If a setlist is provided and a PRO does not represent any of the tracks performed, the blanket license still entitles the organization to its percentage, and those funds go into a larger pot of money that is paid out to its songwriters.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI spent most of my career working at a major label and when we put out an artist\u2019s record, we paid for the songs that were on that artist\u2019s record. We didn\u2019t pay every single songwriter that ever existed in the entirety of the universe. And that\u2019s exactly what we\u2019re doing\u201d with blanket licenses, Parks said. \u201cI don\u2019t think that there\u2019s anything necessarily nefarious happening. It is just a really difficult quagmire to unwrap. All this to say, let\u2019s just pay for the songs that we\u2019re using in live.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tPlatforms, including Parks\u2019 Tour Tech, have emerged to help artists easily submit their setlists to the PROs and receive compensation for playing their own works or have the money they are paying in properly distributed to the songwriters they cover. This technology allows touring artists to receive their fair share of the funds collected by their PRO and, as many on the panel stated, could potentially help eliminate the need to blanket licenses so venues and artists are only paying for the songs performed.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThey built this system 100 years ago. They didn\u2019t have what we have today in terms of reporting mechanisms,\u201d Marro said. Marro said platforms like Tour Tech\u2019s SARA (Setlist Aggregator & Royalty Application) provide a straightforward solution to a complicated system and artists could be incentivized to report their setlists to be fairly paid without them or the venue paying a blanket fee. \u201cMost people are playing basically the same set list every night, so just hitting a button, saying, \u2018same songs,\u2019 and then recording it is fairly simple.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tParks added that the United Kingdom\u2019s single PRO, called PRS, has already made strides in correcting similar issues by reaching out to songwriters and encouraging them to submit their setlists. Music Venue Trust, the U.K.\u2019s equivalent to NIVA, has partnered with Audoo to use its Audio Meter technology across a select 120 grassroots music venues to capture exactly what music is being played in real time and gather that data to assess whether current royalty distribution methodologies accurately reflect the music actually being played within the country\u2019s indie venues.<\/p>\n

\n\tDorf said platforms like Shazam have the technology to capture what songs are being played live and could be a solution to the blanket licensing issue as well.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWe all need creators to be on tour to keep our doors open,\u201d said Parks, who added that PRO fees can sometimes be the difference between a tour losing money and a tour breaking even, especially for smaller artists who often perform in independent venues. \u201cThis is money that we\u2019re already paying into the system, so if we can help it get in creators\u2019 pockets to keep them on the road, that helps us keep our doors open, and it keeps us sort of a thriving economy.\u201d<\/p>\n


\"Billboard
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