March 26th, 2010 The Committee
I. HELEN CROSBY LETTER FROM THE MARCH OVERTURE CONCERNING LOCAL ELECTIONS
II. HELP DON’T HINDER!
III. HOLLOW-WOOD
IV. PERFORMANCE TAX COMMENT AND ARTICLE
V. COMMENTS
VI. EVENTS
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Thank you.
===========================
I. HELEN CROSBY LETTER FROM THE MARCH OVERTURE CONCERNING LOCAL ELECTIONS
Resolution No. 3 Passed Without Support of the Rank-and-File
For the Record
Due to a lack of quorum, an Executive Session was called and after
a very controlled and brief discussion (that being each side limited
to five speakers with two minutes each) the motion was voted on by
the Executive Board.
It is important to note the following for the record:
1) Not one rank-and-file member rose to support this Resolution.
2) All those who rose to speak in favor of the resolution were the
elected incumbents.
The reason this Resolution will be challenged is, in part, supported
by the Office of Labor-Management.
Standards:
ยง 452.51 “A union may not adopt rules which in their effect discourage
or paralyze any opposition to the incumbent officers….”
The Resolution, adopted by the Executive Board, in effect reduces the
ability of the membership to collect signatures on nomination petitions
by not allowing those signatures to be gathered on the Union premises.
Our union property is a place that musicians regularly gather and work
their craft. (Contrast this to other unions.) The only vocal support for
this Resolution was from the elected officers, these same elected offi -
cials that have unlimited access (pursuant to our collective bargaining
agreements) to any venue where union musicians are working.
Those present at [the Jan. 25 General Membership] meeting heard these
elected officials (and ONLY elected officials) trying to justify a Resolution,
that, on its face, limits participation in the election process. One officer
even suggested as an alternative to a member’s inability to have access
(because their regular work might be with a small group) they should find
a friend that is playing in a session or orchestra and have them get the
signatures for them. Really?!! Just how does a member go about campaigning
in this manner? The Labor Management Reporting Act and the Office of
Labor Management Standards are for the oversight and accountability of labor
unions. This change in our Bylaws will be challenged.
In Solidarity,
Helen Crosby, Local 47 member
[Colleagues, we couldn't agree more.]
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March 19th, 2010 The Committee
I. ROYALTY CHECKS VIA SOUNDEXCHANGE
II. RMA/AFM COMMENT
III. COMMENTS
IV. EVENTS
===========================
I. Take your royalty checks, SoundExchange begs
[COLLEAGUES, we thought this article might be of interest to our
composer and freelance members, but our printing this does not
constitute our endorsement of the company involved. This is for
informational purposes only.]
Money is piling up from digital music streams, and
the nonprofit has to track down artists who don’t know.
Then it has to convince them it’s not a scam.
By Alex Pham
5:41 PM PST, March 12, 2010
When John Boydston got an e-mail from SoundExchange saying he
had several thousand dollars in unclaimed royalties, he did what
most sensible people would do. He ignored it.
To the rock musician from Atlanta, “money for nothing” meant
a song by Dire Straits, not a stranger contacting him out of the
blue promising to cut him big checks.
But then he got the message again six months later. Curious, he
called SoundExchange. “Sure enough, they had a sizable amount of
money for me,” said Boydston, 51, whose band Daddy a Go Go includes
his two teenage sons. “It was several thousand dollars. That’s not a ton
of money. But for a guy who makes CDs in his basement, it was enough
to finance my next album.”
Boydston’s money came from royalties that SoundExchange has
squirreled away on his behalf since 2001, when Congress created
the nonprofit to collect royalties from digital music streams on
Internet, satellite radio and cable television. So far, the group has
distributed about $360 million to more than 45,000 artists and
copyright holders.
But at any given time,about 25% of the money SoundExchange
gets from online music services such as Pandora, XM Radio and
Last.fm can’t be distributed because the artists can’t be tracked down.
Currently, that amounts to about $50 million. And with the rising
popularity of Internet radio, the cash pile has been growing, said
John Simson, SoundExchange’s executive director.
The problem stems from what Simson calls “bad data.” Music services
have been required by law since 2001 to send royalty payments to
SoundExchange for the songs they stream online. But they often provide
scant details. Stations routinely get promotional discs in the mail that
aren’t properly labeled, so the performers often go uncredited. Other
times, music services keep sloppy records of the songs they play. Some
tunes, for example, are titled “Unknown” and performed by “Various
Artists.”
“We have this inside joke that if you want to make millions in the music
business, just form a record label called Unknown and a band called
Various Artists, and before you’ve even recorded a track, you can collect
millions of dollars,” Simson said.
The problem primarily hits niche artists and older performers whose
works are less widely recognized. Boydston, for instance, has self-
published six children’s rock albums over the last decade. He estimates
that he’s sold 30,000 discs in total.
“I’m a niche within a niche,” he said. “People like me fall below the radar.”
The “dirty data” phenomenon hampers the collection of royalties by
other groups as well.
“This affects everyone,” said Patrick Sullivan, chief of RightsFlow, which
helps track a separate set of royalties. “Without proper data, we can’t
get the money out to the license holders. We have to do it better,
because ultimately if we don’t get paid, no one gets paid.”
To fill in the blanks, SoundExchange has a campaign to scour social
networks such as Facebook and MySpace Music, to work with companies
that provide independent artists with services such as CD Baby and
ReverbNation and to hit music festivals and events.
Next week at the South by Southwest music festival in Austin,
four or five SoundExchange employees will fan out, armed with a list
of 450 artists who collectively are owed about $250,000. The vast
majority don’t know about the money they are owed, so it will be up to
SoundExchange to look for them by attending their shows or camping
out at the registration desks.
If they are like Lexi Street, lead singer for the Lexi Street Band in
Atlanta, they will be highly skeptical.
“Someone tracking you down and giving you money? It just doesn’t
exist,” Street said, describing how she reacted when SoundExchange
called her in April. “I was like, what do I need to do? Give them my
soul? As an independent artist, you get so many pitches that try to
nickel and dime you for one gimmick or another.”
Street was eventually convinced by the voice at the other end of the
line. She registered her songs with SoundExchange and received two
checks totaling just over $500. She used the money toward the cost
of recording her second album, “Champagne Promises.”
Not everyone signs up. Some even flatly refuse to take the money,
believing it to be a con, SoundExchange’s Simson said.
Joyce Moore, the wife and manager of Sam Moore, a Grammy Award-
winning soul singer, said she routinely encounters skeptical artists,
even after she tells the story of how her husband’s first check was
enough to cover six months’ worth of property taxes on their
Scottsdale, Ariz., home, with some left over for “a couple of nice
dinners.”
“A lot of legacy artists don’t understand what it is, and they think
the money isn’t real,” Moore said. “I tell them it isn’t charity. It isn’t
funky. It isn’t a scam. It’s the real deal.”
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March 12th, 2010 The Committee
I. ANOWAC’S PRESIDENT ANSWERS OUR QUESTIONS
II. LONDON BALLYHOO COMMENT
III. FEATURED COMMENT: A WAY FORWARD?
IV. SHE JUST CAN’T HELP IT
V. COMMENTS
VI. EVENTS
===========================
I. ANOWAC’S PRESIDENT ANSWERS OUR QUESTIONS
ANOWAC’S President, Darius Campo, was kind enough to send us
this reply to our questions. We are thankful that he took the time
to answer our questions and we wish his group the very best of luck.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Dear COMMITTEE,
Thank you for publishing my full email. I think it is wonderful
you have a forum like this. It is important to hear all opinions.
I wanted to answer the questions you presented to me and at the
same time point out that the letter I wrote and asked you to publish
was obviously targeted for a musical audience. In my letters to
other organizations they would understandably read differently. If
you look at the letter and certainly visit the website you will see that
ANOWAC (American National Organization Workers As Consumers)
is for all American workers and just happens to be founded by a
musician.
1) Exactly who is on your board.
We are a grass-roots organization. I have hand picked my staff
and we act as a board. We are presently considering and possibly
looking for a celebrity/major name to give a grander national presence.
2) You say you are already fully staffed, who is your staff?
If you go to the website, in the profile tab, you will see four
other names and bios besides mine.
The vice president and other associate have been in the ANOWAC
office 9-5, Monday-Friday (plus numerous evenings and weekends)
since January 4th. My attorneys under contract work from their
offices and are always available. In addition I have a full-time
programmer in charge of the website (he will remain nameless
for ANOWAC security reasons at this point, but I assure you it is
not a musician and unlikely you know or ever heard of him).
I also have a national publicist working for me on the east coast.
In addition I have another new associate added to the team under
contract and they may be added to our website profiles in the
next week or two.
ANOWAC staff will grow as necessary in the future.
3) Exactly how will your money be spent?
As you can see from the size of my staff there is a cost to
running an organization. If The Committee has a doubt to
the legitimacy to my staff I would invite you over to look
at my check ledger for the ANOWAC corporation. This is
personal information and you would have to sign a statement
that you would not give particulars to amounts, etc., but only
verify that I have a full staff as stated.
So in response to your statement the money from membership
will be used to pay salaries, market the company and gather more
members. Having a large membership is the key to being able to
bring change.
There also may be a considerable amount of travel to meet with
organizations around the country. Once we have a large membership
we will need financial reserves so we can issue Nation Boycotts against
companies that won’t respond to our requests to Stop Outsourcing
and/or bring back lost American jobs. These companies will threaten
with lawsuits and a large cash reserve will be available for additional
legal council. We won’t be intimidated. In addition there are costs of
running an office and business including insurance, supplies, etc.
ANOWAC has been 100% funded by me. Now that we are taking
members that will also fund ANOWAC.
By the way, just about all of this information is on the website.
4) Who will most directly benefit from your efforts? Only musicians,
or non-musicians as well?
American workers will benefit.
The American economy will benefit.
America will benefit.
As far as what I can hope to do for musicians is the following. With
recording musicians I hope to influence American movies to be scored
in America. ANOWAC’s job is not to decide which American scores are
recorded where or by which composer, contractor or players. Let’s have
an additional 100-200 films scored in the US next year, but I will let the
AFM, RMA, Seattle, Cash-Kings, Committee members, etc. fight over
getting these jobs. - Use a track and field race at the summer Olympics
as an example. When you see the runners coming around the last turn
aren’t you first looking for the shirt that says USA, do you care what
color they are or that they are from the east coast or they went to
UCLA and you went to USC and so on? To go even further, if there
are two runners with the USA colors, then you might favor one because
of any one of numerous reasons. Perhaps one went to your college and
that would bring positive publicity to your alma mater,etc.
Orchestra’s have been folding and cutting down their seasons do to
a national economic crisis. Turning around the US economy will also
turn around funding for the arts. Similarly school budgets have been
cut and music jobs have been hit hard. So creating more jobs, creates
more taxes, which gives the government more revenue for schools.
5) Considering your position in the RMA, there will be those who
will worry that this might be an attempt to build a lobbying wing
of the RMA using non-RMA member money.
The first part of your question is interesting but I am not entirely
sure what you mean. I am a member of the RMA. I have no position
with the RMA. I was the only person ever to create a RMA presidential
election with more than one candidate. Not a popular move by the
way, but as you may start to see I call things as I see them. I feel
all Americans (and musicians) need help and we are not seeing
anything concrete from our politicians. So as an American citizen
I am standing up and using my constitutional rights to make a
change. As far as a lobbying-wing for the RMA, wow, I hope by
now you realize that is not where I am coming from. This is
about the United States of America! I hope you see a much
bigger picture to what ANOWAC is trying to do.
6) Can you assure us that your group has no connection
whatsoever with the RMA, not even to the level of Webmaster?
ANOWAC welcomes all Americans to be members. All political parties,
all races, sexual orientations, all religions, and all RMA members and
all The Committee readers and followers.
I am a member of the RMA as we established before. However to
answer your question directly I can state that I started ANOWAC
100% on my own and there are no other musicians connected
with ANOWAC operations.
I hope these answers clarified any questions that The Committee
or its followers might have. I leave you with one suggestion,
one question and one request.
Suggestion: I suggest you take a real look at what has happened
to the US job market and economy and not over-think ANOWAC.
We are simply the only organization in America solely dedicated t
o Stop US companies from foreign outsourcing and return jobs
back to Americans.
Question: If ANOWAC was a success wouldn’t you be better off?
Request: Join today at www.ANOWAC.org
http://www.ANOWAC.org
Thank you,
Darius Campo
ANOWAC Founder and President
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March 5th, 2010 The Committee
I. FEATURED COMMENT FROM CANADIAN LOCAL BOARD MEMBER
II. FEATURED COMMENT: HIGHER STANDARDS
III. FEATURED COMMENT: ANOWAC
IV. ASMAC LUNCHEON FEATURING BRUCE MILLER
V. COMMENTS
VI. EVENTS
===========================
I. FEATURED COMMENT FROM CANADIAN LOCAL BOARD MEMBER
Greetings from your North-Eastern Neighbours,
I have been following the various debates in the Committee newsletter for several
years. Some of it I have agreed with, some of it I have not. I may not agree with
all of the politics, and there were admittedly times when I found the repeated
bashing of a given individual or group to be unprofessional and devoid of any
purpose from my perspective, but I believe wholeheartedly in freedom of expression.
To date, I have never responded to any of your articles or the comments of your
readership, as I am clearly not a member of Local 47 or the RMA, but after the last
newsletter I felt it was time to chime in and “express” a bit myself (with apologies
for the length of my dissertation).
First, regarding the recent Pete Anthony saga and his purported non-union work in
the UK: just because it’s not happening here, doesn’t necessarily make it a “non-union”
session, as we aren’t the only professional musicians’ union in the world. In the EU
they have the Musicians’ Union (http://www.musiciansunion.org.uk/) which purportedly
represents over 30,000 musicians. Has anybody checked to see if the musicians on the
fabled Nanny McPhee session were members of that organisation (or any other union,
for that matter)? If they were, how do THEY feel about their work going to somebody
from outside of their union? Was/is there an agreement in place between the MU and
the AFM? Is one needed?
Second, to the comment on “Hobbyist Locals” from one of your readers: AFM Local
815, of which I am a member, is a small Local, representing the Canadian province
of New Brunswick. On behalf of our membership, I say, “we’re insulted!” We are
not a “Hobbyist Local,” least of all because of our relative size. Yes, we have a
relatively small membership (which generally has hovered between 200 and 250
musicians for the past couple of years), but most of our members are either symphonic
musicians (many performing with the union orchestra, “Symphony New Brunswick,”
for example), recording musicians (performing extensively with the Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation or for other TV/Radio/Film scoring, or just recording
independently), touring musicians, and/or freelancers. We don’t attract a lot of
“hobbyists” per se; there are thousands of casual players in our jurisdiction, to be sure,
but precious few would be willing to pay annual dues or give up any portion of their
income as work dues just to claim to be members of our illustrious organisation. They
come to us when they’re ready to get serious. Hence, we represent the pros that we have.
That’s our job!
That is not to say that all of our members are full-time musicians; many do maintain
day-jobs or teach in order to survive, if only because there isn’t always enough
performance/recording work to go around, as I am sure can be said for thousands
of members in larger Locals (and I believe a lot more RMALAers are going to have to
get used to doing the same if they continue business as usual). Given the golden
opportunity to live off of lucrative film scoring sessions and residuals, I am sure
most of our members would abandon their day-jobs in a heartbeat. Lack of work
doesn’t make them any less professional in their attitudes, behaviours, or abilities;
they declare income, they pay taxes and work dues, and they generally present
themselves with a respectful demeanour and even a degree of humility. What’s more,
the vast majority of our members are incredibly capable - I dare say, comparable to
the calibre of many of the RMA elite of LA, NY, and Nashville - and, despite the
ramblings of a few malcontents in the RMA, more than deserving of the coveted
recording work that has been rapidly fleeing RMA centers of operation. In fact,
many stay here (rather than move to a larger Local) in an effort to raise the standards
for local music and hopefully improve the local music industry for future generations.
The truth of the matter is that just because your Local is larger does not mean the
musicians are better or more professional, any more than being rich makes anyone
better than those who are poor; in a lot of cases, it just means they’re more fortunate.
I’m not saying LA/NY/Nashville didn’t work hard to build their music industries - clearly
they worked very hard indeed - just that they have relied on good fortune easily as
much as talent for a long time, and fortunes change. They now face being deposed by
other parts of the world that have worked even harder. That’s LIFE. The sooner the
larger Locals and the RMA get it through their heads that they’re working in a GLOBAL
marketplace - yes, that includes all the other countries, even the ones where the
AFM and RMA have never been heard of - the more likely they’ll be able to avoid bankrupcy.
Elitism is not a salable commodity, so it’s time to stop treating it as a valuable export.
The trophy bucks have almost all fled for greener pastures and no-hunting zones, so
if you want to eat, you’re going to have to learn to hunt smaller game like the rest of us.
Don’t expect us to make it easier for you out of pity; we grieve for your loss, but we
plan to keep eating, too! In the mean time, as long as you insist on driving work away
from LA/NY/Nashville by asking for more money than your product is worth in the Global
economy, we’ll gladly take it off your hands; any film scoring that can be legally recorded
(under AFM Contracts and Agreements) here in Eastern Canada will be more than welcome.
We’ll happily set up a “larger-game” preserve to help keep the work in the AFM (as long
as it can be done without violating existing contracts, agreements, or bylaws)! I believe
we can do the job quite well; you’ll be amazed to discover that musical instruments can
sound as beautiful without any of the players raising their noses or chins in the air.
Regardless of whatever else the future may hold, you can rest assured that we “Hobbyist
Locals” will continue to hold our ground against ANYBODY who tries to tell us that we
aren’t entitled to adequate representation or aren’t allowed to make our living within the
bounds of the bylaws of the AFM.
With that, I’ll let you all go. Perhaps I’ll get a chance to meet some of you if I’m fortunate
enough to represent our Local in Las Vegas this year. Remember, regardless of our politics,
we are all musicians, brothers and sisters united by similar skills, goals, and aspirations.
I wish every success to all of my colleagues throughout the AFM. Yours in solidarity,
Greg Marks
executive board member / office administrator
New Brunswick Musicians’ Association, AFM Local 815
FOLLOWUP COMMENT FROM MR. MARKS
Hello Again,
As I was looking at the last newsletter once more, something else occurred to me
regarding the comment on “Hobbyist Locals” that I hadn’t mentioned in my earlier
response. Is the commenter lacking some basic mathematical skill? It is asserted
in the comment that if we were on a 1-vote-per-member system, then things would
be “far different.” The commenter tries to imply that the majority (part-time musicians)
wouldn’t be able to vote down the minority (full-time musicians). Regardless of whether
votes are 1-per-member or not, the minority is still outnumbered; it is inherent in the
very definition of the word.
Even in the larger Locals, the part-timers outnumber the full-timers (and I suspect
some of the smaller Locals have a much larger percentage of full-timers than the
larger Locals do. It would be interesting to run an AFM census to find out). Unless the
commenter is implying that the delegates should cast votes in a manner that is not
representative of the interests of their respective constituencies - a true “perversion
of democracy,” if ever there was one - I fail to see how the minority could benefit
from this arrangement. Take another look at those numbers; you may well discover
that you’re better off the way things are.
[Mr. Marks,
Bravo! As a small addition to your thoughts above. As we all now know, the elites who
just a few years ago said anyone who didn't make their full living from recording are
amateurs or hobbyists are now doing demos and in many cases non-union dates
here in Los Angeles. We've now confirmed that some of those same elites are playing
student film scoring classes at USC and UCLA. Those are important to be sure, but a
few years ago these folks would have said playing such things is "beneath" them.
Still, the RMA tries to blame Tom Lee for what they've done to all of us.
As we're fond of metaphors, here's another: It's like someone slamming their car
into a brick wall while they're the only one wearing a seat beat, then trying to
blame the dealership for the damage.
(And the AFM is not Toyota or Lexus!)]
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