Earn money from your music in the UK

Making, performing, and releasing music can sometimes feel like a labor of love; well sometimes we are even expected to pay to play concerts. However, there can be so many costs involved: equipment, instruments, recordings, studio, music training/lessons… not to mention the hours we spend composing, practicing, marketing and promoting. And we can’t expect the world to owe us anything (or much) for what we choose or need to do. It’s survival fit testing, right? The loudest music gets the revenue.

Well, the loudest and/or most popular music can get the most revenue and a lot of money. But they’re not necessarily the only ones making money from music. OK, I may not be talking about millions or new cars or houses here. But less active musicians can raise small amounts of income. If you perform gigs at live music venues, release or sell your own music, or play on less mainstream radio shows, you can still make some money from music.

Of course, there are a few things you need to do first to make sure the world knows about your music. I’ll cover the UK here as this is what I know about living and releasing independent music here. You must join the bodies PRS For Music and PPL (Phonographic Performance Ltd). Then you register any recordings and releases (if you don’t have a label to do it for you) with the PPL and acquire ISRC for each track. An ISRC is a unique code for each released recording and must be included in the metadata during the mastering process. Ask the mastering engineer to include them or investigate further if you are mastering your own material.

If you’re playing live at your local pub, even at an open mic event, you can still make a little money from your music and claim music royalties. By joining PRS in the UK, you can claim for every performance at a venue that is registered with a PRS music license. There is a PRS license sticker in the window of these places and ask the manager if they are licensed. Most of the time they have to be, even sandwich shops and hairdressers must have licenses to play music in public. Which has its pros and cons, I know, but as a musician you can take a piece of the allotted money by registering your tracks/playlist, even if it’s a small gig with very few audience members.

If you submit your music to radio stations and shows that are likely to like and play your music, then you may well get some airplay and this can add up as well. They are free to join and take a small percentage of the music royalties they claim for you. And they hunt them internationally. Research radio stations that may specialize in your music – I make some pretty unique or weird creative music and still find enough outlets to play and support my independent music.

Third party companies like Sentric Music can make this process much easier as they are free to join and claim music royalties for you. They take a small percentage of the music royalties they claim for you as payment, and their registration system is much simpler and more accessible than I’ve found going directly to the PRS site. Just let them know when your music is playing on any radio show you know of and tell them about any live show with song list. They also send regular requests for music for TV commercials etc. Now, that may be an artist’s dream that can come true in terms of music royalties.

Finally, selling your independent music for yourself has surely never been easier. Sites like CD Baby and Bandcamp allow you to offer your independent albums and singles for whatever price you want. And you receive most of the income. Through CD Baby you can also put your music on iTunes and Spotify, which can mean more listens, sales and royalties. On Bandcamp you can give away your music for free or set a price to pay for download/purchase of items. Alternatively, you can set a minimum amount and you will invariably find that some followers will pay more than this.

So we may not all be making a lot of money from our music, but you could be losing some of your rightful money. In fact, you could make quite a bit of money from your music. I have only shared a few avenues of income that I know of and I reap rewards from making my creative music. It can be simple and it could be a staggering amount. More tips and information can be found on the PRS for Music, PPL and Sentric Music websites and in a comprehensive search engine search.