It’s impossible to put a price on music

It’s impossible to put a price on music. Can you imagine a nice friendly pub without music, for example? Research has shown that the right choice of music improves turnover. Customers like having music; they stay longer and are more likely to come back. Shopkeepers can even boost the sales of particular products through the type of music. Play French chansons in the supermarket and French wines will suddenly be favoured. In addition, staff put a bit more effort into their work when music is being played. It’s no surprise that there’s a Dutch radio programme called arbeidsvitaminen – ‘vitamins for work’.

Works of music are protected

Music is the work of lyricists and composers. Their texts and compositions are subject to music copyright. This gives the music authors the exclusive right to exploit their work commercially, i.e. earn money from it.

Permission and remuneration for using music

A composition or text is the intellectual property of whoever created it. The Dutch Copyright Act states that you must first have their permission before you can use the music, in just the same way as you ask someone’s permission to borrow their car. Once you have permission, you can play the music in public, broadcast it or record it on CD. And, in the same way you pay your energy bills, you also pay an appropriate remuneration to the music author.

The role of Buma/Stemra

Do you like using music in your shop or restaurant? Do you want to put someone’s composition on CD or have it heard on your website? Asking the various individual music authors for permission and sorting out the payments would involve quite an effort. Fortunately, you can arrange this permission through a single body: Buma/Stemra. We handle the copyright exploitation for over 16,000 Dutch music authors and publishers. If you use foreign music, you can arrange the remunerations for it through us as well.

Buma/Stemra collects and distributes the remunerations

Buma/Stemra collects remunerations from music users and distributes them among the music authors who are members. This is a complex process, if you stop to consider that there are tens of thousands of music users and two million declared music creations. In order to keep this process as simple as possible, we sign contracts with umbrella organisations for music users and sometimes with the individual users. The money we receive from them is distributed among the music authors whose creations have been used, according to the type of usage.

Which other bodies do you have to deal with?

To be able to use music, more than just a payment via Buma/Stemra is sometimes needed. This is because we only actually handle the commercial exploitation of the rights of music authors and publishers. However, there are others who also have rights related to musical works - the performers who have interpreted the music, singers and bands, for example. This can also apply to the record companies who have produced the CDs. Sometimes there are also rights relating to TV and film images, on DVD for example.

You pay a remuneration to the performing artist(s) and the record producers through the Foundation for the Exploitation of Neighbouring Rights (Stichting ter Exploitatie van Naburige Rechten, SENA). For the rights to TV and film images, this is done through the VIDEMA Foundation (Stichting VIDEMA). For more information about paying for the use of music please fill in our contact form.