#IRespectMusic Group Asks iHeartMedia, Cumulus Boards For Meetings To Discuss AM/FM Performance Royalty

Wants Meetings

A campaign to require radio stations to pay performance royalties is asking the Boards of Directors of iHEARTMEDIA and CUMULUS for meetings to talk about the matter. #IRespectMusic founder BLAKE MORGAN wrote letters to iHEART CEO/Chairman BOB PITTMAN, CUMULUS Chairman ANDREW HOBSON, and other board members of the two radio companies, noting that broadcasters have made billions each year from playing music but "have never paid a penny to the artists who make your profits possible.” MORGAN wrote, “We’re writing to ask for your help to finally bring an end to this injustice. The times we find ourselves in are changing, rapidly, and Americans know and act on injustice when they see it.”

MORGAN said, “The message to iHEART, CUMULUS and all other large broadcasting companies is we are not going away. They cannot hide behind their lobbying arm the NAB any longer. We are asking them to meet to discuss how artists can be paid.”

A bill that would create a performance royalty to be paid by AM and FM stations, the American Music Fairness Act, will be the subject of a hearing by the HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE TOMORROW (2/2).

NABOB, Former FEMA Boss Argue Against Royalty

The idea of a performance royalty isn't as palatable to the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF BLACK OWNED BROADCASTERS, which sent a letter MONDAY (1/31) to HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE leaders, opposing the American Music Fairness Act and supporting the competing Local Radio Fairness Act. The letter from NABOB Pres. JAMES WINSTON to committee Chairman JERRY NADLER (D-NY) and ranking member JIM JORDAN (R-OH) cited Black-owned stations' struggles to survive the pandemic and argued that free radio airplay earns the recording industry over $2.4 billion annually; it sid that a royalty "would create severe economic hardships for local African American owned radio stations, as well as stations serving other underserved communities, and in so doing would jeopardize local jobs and harm local radio listeners." 

Also weighing in with a letter to NADLER and JORDAN opposing the royalty was former FEDERAL EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT AGENCY Administrator CRAIG FUGATE, who contended that local broadcasters' emergency services argue against "imposing unnecessary financial burdens on local radio broadcasters that could impede their critical public safety and national security role."

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