(L-R): John Van Mol, chairman of the board, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame Foundation; Gregg Morton, President of AT&T of Tennessee and inductees Tony Arata, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Larry Henley and Kim Williams.

Chapter 408

On Sunday evening (10/7) at the Renaissance Hotel downtown, Tony Arata, Mary Chapin Carpenter, Larry Henley and Kim Williams took their places in the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, while the late song publisher Donna Hilley was also honored.

Their inductions were accompanied by momentous news. On Thursday (10/4), Mayor Karl Dean announced that the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame will become the anchor attraction in the massive, new Music City Center. The Hall has been just a virtual entity for more than four decades.

“After 42 years, we’re finally going to build a Hall of Fame,” said Troy Tomlinson to the capacity hotel ballroom crowd. “Nashville will be the first city, anywhere, to house a songwriters hall of fame.” He entreated the attendees to make financial pledges toward the creation of the exhibit space. The facility will also include a songwriters’ plaza performance venue and entryway stone steps engraved with the name of each songwriter in the Hall plus a representative song title.

Tomlinson also recalled the late Frances Preston, who passed away on June 13. She was a presence at BMI for six decades, and the Frances Williams Preston Mentor Award is named in her honor. “We were blessed to know her, and we miss our friend and our close confidante,” said Tomlinson.

This year’s recipient of the award is the late Donna Hilley of Sony/ATV-Tree publishing. Don Cook, Paul Worley and Kix Brooks honored her with heartfelt and telling anecdotes. Hilley’s three daughters accepted on her behalf. Hilley died on June 20.

Richard Leigh inducted Larry Henley into the Hall. Bekka Bramlett & Billy Burnette saluted Henley with soulful versions of the songwriter’s “Is It Still Over,” “Lizzie and the Rainman,” “He’s a Heartache” and “Til I Get it Right.” Trisha Yearwood sang “The Wind Beneath My Wings” for the tunesmith. “I’m about to cry,” responded Henley. “I fee like Susan Lucci.” Like the much Emmy-nominated TV soap star, Henley has been nominated for this honor many prior times. “This is a treasure to me,” Henley continued. “This is a blessing.”

Garth Brooks inducted Kim Williams, singing “New Way to Fly,” “Papa Loved Mama” and “Three Wooden Crosses” in his honor. “Looking backward, it looks like something planned it,” said Williams of his remarkable journey. “God planned it.” His saga includes a horrific East Tennessee industrial accident and multiple reconstructive surgeries. During his lengthy recuperation in Nashville, he began to write. Williams also overcame alcoholism, pain-pill addiction, narcolepsy and a nearly fatal automobile accident. “I dedicate this award to my wife, Phyllis, who has walked through fire for me,” he said. “She was there when my world turned to ashes and pain.”

Don Schlitz did the honors for his sometime song collaborator Mary Chapin Carpenter. “She has no idea the impact her songs have had on the Nashville songwriting community,” he said. Marc Cohn performed Carpenter’s anthemic “The Hard Way.” Yearwood returned to the stage to sing the Carpenter/Schlitz hit “He Thinks He’ll Keep Her.” “Songwriting has been the one constant in my life, since I was in the second grade,” said Carpenter. “This town is filled with songwriters who have inspired me and allowed me to stand on their shoulders. I am humbled beyond words.”

Pat Alger inducted fellow Georgia native Tony Arata. Accompanied by Jelly Roll Johnson, super vocalists Fred Knobloch and Pete Wasner sang the Arata songs “Here I Am,” “I’m Holding My Own,” “The Change” and “I Used to Worry.” I yearned for my favorite Arata song, “Handful of Dust,” but it was not to be. Brooks reappeared to cap the salute with “The Dance.” “This is a town where some of the most important chapters in the American songbook have been written,” said Arata. “We all come here with the same hope, that we might put something to paper worth remembering. Thank you for this evening, for the chance to share it with family and friends. It’s a sweet memory.”

The ballroom was awash with songwriting greats. Attending were such former Hall of Fame inductees as Jerry Foster, Jerry Chesnut, Roger Murrah, Roger Cook, Tom Shapiro, Thom Schuyler, Bobby Braddock, Bob DiPiero, Allen Reynolds, Allen Shamblin, Paul Overstreet and Kenny O’Dell. In addition to inductors Alger, Leigh, Brooks and Schlitz, the room also held Mark D. Sanders, Hugh Prestwood, Dennis Morgan, Whitey Shafer, Gary Burr, Mike Reid, Dickey Lee, Red Lane, Ted Harris, Kye Fleming, Phil Everly, Wayne Carson, Rory Bourke and Matraca Berg.

NSF board chairman John Van Mol welcomed the crowd and later thanked announcer Bill Cody, publicist Jenny Bohler, event director Mark Ford, production coordinator Erika Wollam Nichols, the rest of the NSF board and returning Gold Sponsor AT&T and its exec Gregg Morton.

The Nashville Songwriters Association International’s Bart Herbison and Lee Miller began the gala by presenting this year’s NSAI “10 Songs I Wish I’d Written,” as voted on by its membership. They were “A Woman Like You” by Phil Barton/Johnny Bulford/Jon Stone, “Better Than I Used to Be” by Ashley Gorley/Bryan Sampson, “Cost of Livin’” by Phillip Coleman/Ronnie Dunn, “Even If it Breaks Your Heart” by Will Hoge/Eric Paslay, “Fly Over States” by Michael Dulaney/Neil Thrasher, “Just Fishin’” by Casey Beathard/Monty Criswell/Ed Hill, “Red Solo Cup” by Brett & Jim Beavers/Brett & Brad Warren, “Springsteen” by Eric Church/Jeff Hyde/Ryan Tyndell and “You and Tequila” by Matraca Berg/Deana Carter.

Recording artists Church, Dunn and Hoge were not present. Neither was Song of the Year winner Dolly Parton, whose “I Will Always Love You” returned to the charts following Whitney Houston’s death this year. Dolly sent a video: “I will treasure this,” she said. “I will put it in my museum in Dollywood, but it will be near and dear to my heart.”

Also sending a video was Songwriter/Artist of the Year winner Taylor Swift. This was her fifth time in six years to claim this prize. “I’m blown away,” she said via video. “Thank you for doing that. Keep doing that. I am so happy. I’ll see you guys soon.”

Dallas Davidson won the NSAI’s Songwriter of the Year honor. His recent copyrights include “We Owned the Night,” “Just a Kiss,” “Country Girl (Shake it for Me)” and “If Heaven Wasn’t So Far Away.” “I’m truly blessed to be the guy this year,” said Davidson. “I thank God.”

We dined on iceberg lettuce wedges with blue cheese and bacon crumbles, a main course of steak and mixed veggies or a ratatouille-and-cheese torte, with pumpkin cheesecake for dessert.

Attending fabulons included Tim Nichols, Tim Fink, Pat Collins, Pat Higdon, Mark Mason, Marc Beeson, Mark Miller, Melanie Howard, Perry Howard, Barry Walsh, Barry Coburn, John Briggs, Jon Vezner, John Beiter, Juan Contreras, Jim Rooney, Rep. Jim Cooper, Jenny Yates, Billy Yates, Billy Ray Cyrus, Bill Catino, Ron Cox, Ron Samuels, Dan Hill, Dan Ekback, Sherrill Blackman, Rep. Marsha Blackburn, Roy Wunsch, Lee Roy Parnell, Joey + Rory, Raul Malo and Byron Hill.

“It’s like being at a family reunion with all the greatest songwriters in the world,” observed Pat Alger.

Spotted in the throng were Gretchen Peters, Kathy Louvin, Bernie Nelson, Larry Weiss, Brett Jones, Suzi Ragsdale, Bucky Wilkin, Corky O’Dell, Duane Eddy, Monty Holmes and Layng Martine Jr., not to mention Amy Kurland, Anita Hogan, Connie Bradley, Nancy Shapiro, Harry Chapman, Lisa Sutton, Dale Bobo, Gilles Godard, Harold Shedd, Sherod Robertson, David Maddox, Andrew Kintz, Wes Bulla, Holly Bell, Chuck Flood, Walter Campbell, Van Tucker, Mike Vaden, Scott Hendricks, Hank Adam Locklin, Diane Pearson, Dennis Lord, Jason Morris, Jewel Coburn, Jody Williams, Terry Wakefield, Bob Doyle and Pete Fisher. 

Laurent Hubert and Darrell Franklin

BMG Rights Management President Creative & Marketing North America Laurent Hubert and Executive VP BMG Chrysalis Darrell Franklin sat down with MusicRow recently to discuss digital music services, growing a recorded music division, buying out KKR, acquisitions and signings. MusicRow Publisher/Owner Sherod Robertson and Sr. News Editor Sarah Skates conducted the interview. See Part 1 here.

MR: Let’s talk about the future of digital music services. 

Hubert: I’m an optimist about the business from that perspective. The idea is to engage at every level, to place as much music as we can. We’ve been very aggressive in the digital space to engage with Google, which has Android and YouTube. We were in negotiation for almost five years with YouTube and settled that earlier this year. Look at Amazon and Apple which are in the hardware business and technology business. They are market makers and it would be silly not to engage with them.

Since 1999 I have used a pre and post-Napster comparison. Pre-Napster, music was bought; post-Napster music is consumed. It is a profound change in the perceived value of music. It’s no longer an activity that you go and buy, it’s in the background of your life, it’s on your PDA, it’s on your computer, or satellite radio. The question is how to monetize it.

In the US, we are in a very unique situation. Under the copyright law we have a set rate, determined by a CRB [Copyright Royalty Board] process. So you don’t really have a willing buyer, willing seller environment yet, but I think eventually we’ll get to that point.

Look at precedents when you have a willing buyer, willing seller. Look at the sync market, you find that market rates are much more favorable than a set rate. Not only is it more favorable in terms of payment themselves, but also in terms of the parity between the label and the publisher: the master is 50% of the fee and publishing is 50% of the fee. That’s clearly not the case today. Look at an iTunes download, where we only get 9.1 cents.

I am convinced that adoption of streaming services will continue to increase, and the real challenge for the industry is how to monetize it. I want to be an optimist that we will ultimately bring those rights to market. In fact, if you look at the CRB, starting in January 2013 the rates have improved, not only in terms of the headline rate, but also in terms of the parity between publishers and master owners, so that’s good news.

MR: Are there any plans to develop a recorded music division?

Hubert: We created a division back in October 2011 where we have both publishing and master, and we work on the 75/25 formula with 75 in favor of the artist/writer. It is taking the concept of a co-pub split and applying it to a label model, where both the publishing and master are crossed. It is not advance driven, it’s project driven.

We commit an investment to a project and every project will have a different team. We have a traffic controller project manager, that handles some of the signings and then assembles the right team around each project. Some projects don’t need radio promotion, and others do, so obviously the investment would be different. We try to customize each project as much as we can. We’ve done a few deals, but we plan to accelerate that in 2013 and Nashville is one of the markets we want to be in.

If you look at [the traditional label model] the biggest issue for artists is number one, they have no real input in the project, basically the label takes control; and number two, they don’t own their masters. They may have those masters reverting at some point, but in most cases they don’t own them. Number three: the lack of transparency when it comes to accounting, in many cases, is appalling.

We looked at it and said, “how can we build an attractive alternative?” We’ve taken into account three pillars. When it comes to control they are going to be partners with us, and because they have 75 percent of every dollar, it creates a sense of partnership because they have skin in the game. If the project does well, the upside is so tremendous that they want to be partners. The second aspect is we don’t actually own the master, we work under an exclusive license for a period of time, typically 12-15 years, but we never really own the master. The third aspect is to provide clear accounting. We build a budget together and both parties approve it, so there won’t be any surprises when the artist gets the statement.

I’m not saying the label model is a bad business, but we don’t think it’s our business. This is an alternative and it doesn’t fit everyone, and we’ve seen that in some negotiations. Some managers who have grown up in the current label system, where there’s little input and you push all the responsibility to the label [don’t like this model]. We go to them and say, “you’re equally responsible, so come to the table and make these decisions,” some of them don’t want to do it, or they prefer a big advance. That doesn’t work for us. Obviously you can’t pay a 75 percent royalty rate and pay a significant advance, because we need to put that advance money toward the project.

MR: What do you want the Nashville music industry to know about BMG?

Hubert: We’ve taken a lot of flack for being a company that is all about acquisitions and I want to address that head on. Bertelsmann is the oldest media company in the world. They strategically exited the record business in 2008, and the music publishing business in 2006 and 2007, not because they didn’t like the business, but because they had to. Today, number one, there is a real commitment to be in this business. This is not about flipping an asset.

Number two, in 2011 we’ve started to invest heavily in talent signings. You can see this especially in Nashville, and not only in the U.S., but across different companies. The U.S. market tends to derive about 60% of our investment, and that’s the nature, the size of the U.S. market. We’ve also been hiring and putting in place a creative and marketing team that is fairly sizable.

Our business is the talent business and we believe in building a catalogue of tomorrow. The only way you can build a catalogue of tomorrow is signing today and taking risks on those investments. We’ve been taking our share of risks of investments and risks in our portfolio. Risks may be different from one market to another or one deal to another, but the idea is to build a business around talent and we’ve done that in Nashville. We’ve invested far more than our share of our market in Nashville and that’s starting to pay, if you look at those recent No. 1 hits we referred to earlier.

Franklin: We are also investing a lot of time, energy and money into developing new writers, because that is what’s so unique about Nashville. If you’re not doing that, if you’re not investing in the future, then you’re not in the game here.

Hubert: Because songwriting is so core to the Nashville business and the way the process works—which is essentially you have to create those opportunities—you can’t be a passive publisher here. You have to be an active publisher and therefore you have to invest, you have to put a team together, and you have to have the best material behind it, which is the writer.

Read Part 1. For more music publishing news, check out MusicRow’s upcoming print Publisher issue.   

Laurent Hubert (L) and Darrell Franklin (R)

BMG Rights Management President Creative & Marketing North America Laurent Hubert and BMG Chrysalis Executive VP Darrell Franklin sat down with MusicRow recently to discuss sync licensing, communication, single strategy and more. MusicRow Publisher/Owner Sherod Robertson and Sr. News Editor Sarah Skates conducted the interview.

MR: How is the music business in Nashville different from other cities?

Hubert: Nashville is a unique place, because songwriting is core to the music business here. That’s not the case anywhere else in the world. For BMG, being in Nashville is absolutely critical. Nashville’s song community is attractive to publishers and writers. In the past five to ten years, Nashville has become less of an island and more cosmopolitan from a songwriting perspective. It is much more open because Nashville writers are starting to write outside of town, and outside writers are coming in.

Franklin: After going back and forth to LA, I see how much control Nashville publishers have, especially getting our own cuts and pitching songs. It’s kind of the last town where that is the main focus.

MR: How does BMG facilitate interaction between Nashville and its other offices?

Franklin: Communication is number one—we are an internationally thinking company. We have an international call every two weeks where for 30 minutes we go through every major act, discussing when they are going in the studio, and what types of songs they are looking for. I started out at Almo Irving, and the strength of that company was the fact that they linked all the international offices together and it was constant connection. BMG is the first place I’ve been since then that has that same focus. It’s all about communication and focus.

Hubert: Internationally, we might have 25 to 30 people on the call. We also have a weekly call here in the US with about 12 to 15 people. We are in about 10 markets, 10 territories, but our goal is to operate as one when it comes to the creative aspect. It starts with philosophy, which is focusing on music. After that, it’s about putting the organization in place that buys into that philosophy and executes on that philosophy. Communication is one part of the equation. The second part is having someone in LA who is dedicated to our Nashville repertoire and interacts with both offices as the ambassador. It started as an experiment this year and is working really nicely. It creates opportunities, and creates a different atmosphere in the LA office, so it’s not purely pop driven. We may create a similar position in New York.

Franklin: It helps with film and TV too; just having that person that’s in their face constantly.

Hubert: I find that Nashville’s sync revenue is typically lower than other catalogues, and I don’t think there’s any good reason for that. I think that [the initiative] starts internally, when somebody realizes this is music that we can place. Perhaps initially, the scope is limited, but it starts with a couple of placements, and then you gain traction.

MR: Has sync licensing become an increasingly important revenue stream in recent years?

Hubert: Generally speaking, you will find that revenue is one-third mechanical, one-third performance, and one-third sync, so sync is definitely a focus, not only for publishers, but for writers. Writers are realizing the record markets are not what they used to be, and will never come back. It’s changing expectations, which puts a greater burden on us to deliver on those expectations. I think some writers are being very clever in the context of writing songs. They are saying, “hey, perhaps there’s a way that I can write songs with a greater potential for TV or film placement.” You want to make sure that you meet that demand.

A lot of people talk about sync when they talk about marketing in the context of publishing, but I think it’s much broader than that. It’s about branding opportunities in this marketplace. Look at digital opportunities, the app world is untouched by music, at least legally untouched by music. What other opportunities are there? We have to start thinking in a more proactive manner in finding other vehicles to promote our music.

MR: What is a specific example of how this has worked for your songwriters?

Franklin: The Civil Wars would be a good one. Their main focus when the band finished their record was to hire a publicist, and then do lots of really discounted licenses, just to get the music out there. They were flexible with the rates so they could grow the brand. Once they built the fan base, the money followed.

Hubert: The film world has not grown if you look at the number of productions. The TV world is where things are happening. But you are competing with a whole host of music for placements. So how do you get through that clutter and place your music? You have to be flexible and creative. You may have to take a lower rate, but out of that you will develop a relationship. You have to be relationship minded as opposed to fee minded, and the relationship element will ultimately bring the fee, or at least give you a competitive advantage over other publishers in licensing your music.

MR: Tell us about your recent string of recent No. 1s. (“Somethin’ ‘Bout A Truck,” “Banjo,” “Home,” “Reality,” “Red Solo Cup”)

Franklin: All publishers go through the same process of pitching songs and trying to make sure that you are on every project, and also being strategic. If you pitch a brand new great song to a new artist, maybe you have a better shot at the single. Going to the big acts, your competition is so tough. You can only control getting on the album to a certain extent. Singles are where the stars align and it all works out.

We are very strategic about going for singles. When a new song comes in, we look at the pitch list and see who is cutting, and where they are in the process. Then we go for the best single chance. With “Red Light,” David Nail’s project was winding down, but the song came in. It felt like the right song and they were looking for a big single. It was a no brainer: let’s take that shot rather than go through the hoops of trying to get it on every other big act.

Hubert: You have to be in the singles business and have the radio performances. It starts from the very beginning of the creative process. I think writers are acutely aware that they have to think about singles themselves. But I don’t think anyone has the magic formula. At the end of the day, it’s about the music and you have to be able to push it through. I think we’ve done a great deal this year and expect to continue that way.

MR: Who are some of your new writers to watch?

Franklin: We have a writer/producer, Brandon Hood, I think he’s going to make a big splash next year. Kylie Sackley has been around town for a little bit, but she has the momentum to really take off. And Jonathan Singleton, who has had some success, but is really coming into his own now, so we’re excited.

The interview will conclude tomorrow (10/4) with Part 2. For more music publishing news, check out MusicRow’s upcoming print Publisher issue.