Most artists find this aspect in the music industry very confusing but the concept of beat licensing is not as hard as you think, all you need is to flow with me in this article. A producer creates a beat and uploads it to his/her beat store for artists to use in their songs, any artiste that finds a beat more interesting as well as suits his style of music can buy and download directly from the producers beat store. After the purchase, the producer will issue the artist a document that grants the artist certain user-rights to create and distribute a song, a license agreement.

The permission to use a beat as an artist that is backed up with legal proof from the producer is known as a LICENSE AGREEMENT

A license is very crucial in the sense that asking a producer for free beats does not grant you the right to use the beat because there is no legal authorization, hence, it is useless.

NON-EXCLUSIVE BEAT LICENSING

The most common type of beat licensing is non-exclusive also known as ‘leasing’. You can buy a non-exclusive license agreement and release a song on Spotify, iTunes, Apple music as well as shoot a music video for YouTube that can generate money for you.

A producer’s online beat store simply issues you this type of license when you purchase a beat, in other words, you don’t have to inquire from them. In most cases for highly sophisticated websites, a license agreement is auto-generated, including the buyer’s name, address, a timestamp, the users-rights, and the necessary information of the producer.

The producer still retains the copyright ownership and the artist has to adhere to the rights granted in the agreement once he/she receives the beat to create a song of their own and distribute it online.

CONSTRAINT OF NON-EXCLUSIVE BEAT LICENSING

A non-exclusive license also has an expiration date. Meaning that it’s only going to be valid for a short period of time ranging from 1 – 10 years. After that set period the license has to be renewed. Most non-exclusive licenses have a limitation on sales, plays, views, and streams, that is the license will also need to be renewed as soon as the buyer reaches the maximum amount of streams even before the expiration date of the contract. Several artists can be licensed to use this beat for their productions. It is more advisable for upcoming artists to settle for this type of license. Different producers with non-exclusive licensing options and packages.

EXCLUSIVE BEAT LICENSING

In this category of beat licensing, the artist has full authorization and exploits the song to the fullest. In other words, when you own the exclusive rights to a beat there are no limitations on users’ rights. There is no maximum number of streams, plays, downloads, and expiration date of the contract. The song could be used in numerous projects ranging from albums, music videos, singles, EP’s… after a beat is sold exclusively, the producer is no longer allowed to sell or license the beat to others. The exclusive selling of beats can be further subdivided into two:

• Selling Ownership
• Selling Exclusive Right

SELLING EXCLUSIVE RIGHT, the producer remains the original author of the music and is still eligible to collect writers’ share and publishing rights.

SELLING EXCLUSIVE OWNERSHIP, the producer no longer has the copyright and authorship as the interest of the beat has been sold. This can also be known as ‘work-for-hire’.Basically, the artist retains actual ownership over the beat. Hence, from that point onward he/she is considered the legal author of the beat. This type of beat licensing suits artists under a record label and artists with a large fanbase.