Music
There are laws in place when it comes to
including and choosing music for Radio advertisements, you cannot just choose
any music and include it in a radio advert. You cannot use any material that
could infringe copyright. Copyright infringement is when a third party owns
that music and you will need the permission from that party in order to use
that music. There are several laws that state you cannot play music that is
copyright material, meaning it is own by someone else and has royalties with
that track. Royalties is where you have to pay a specific fee in order to have
the permission to use that music.
Music has a very key part in radio adverts,
it helps entice the audience and keep them interested along with helping create
the desired emotion or mood for that advert. Without music, the advert could
come across as very boring or dull. The music you use will depend on the
context of the advert. The producers will usually choose music that works well
with the product or service being advertised. There often can be difficulty
with choosing the right music because of limited choice of soundtracks
available that are without copyright.
A problem that makes the issue of copyright
more complicated is that often, advertisers and radio stations can be unsure
about exactly what they are or are not allowed to play or use. This is due to
the fact Radio stations usually have licenses which will allow and permit them
to play songs that have copyright for entertainment purposes, however these
licenses usually do not cover the use for commercial advertisements. This means, if the advertiser uses a song
without permission, the legal responsibility and repercussions will be on them
and not the radio station.
Fair use: It is illegal to use any
copyrighted material or music, when it exceeds fair use. This means if any of
the core parts of the music or material has been used, then it has exceeded
fair use. It’s illegal to use any music or material that can be easily
recognized when you don’t have the permission to do so.
Licensing: It is indeed possible to use a
song you wish to use, there are in fact ways to get its use approved. However
this will require two licenses, one from the owner of the music and one from
the owners of the copyright recording.
The 7 Second Rule: A lot of advertisers
will use the ‘7 Second Rule’. This is the idea of you can include any song as
long as it only plays for 7 seconds or less. However, this rule from a legal
view does not actually exist and still breaches copyright without the licensing
permissions.
Strategies: As you can see, copyright law
is very complicated and thorough, and can also be very expensive to gain the
correct copyright. Therefore an option would be to compose or purchasing the
copyright for the song and then record the song by another musician instead of
the original artist.
In my college, we have our own radio
station with a catalogue of Production Music and Production FX, this is all
completely royalty and copyright free which means we can use these for radio
advertising. There is no copyright protection on any of these sounds or tracks,
so we are free to use them without infringing copyright.
Production Music:
Production FX:
