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The Art of the Deal- Collaboration Agreements

© Kent Newsome

Shortly after I started my web site to promote my music and seek contacts in the music industry, I received a glowing email from a guy named Bill. He said I was the greatest lyricist this side of Robert Hunter and begged to collaborate with me on some lyrics I had posted on my site. Pleased with the quick success of my internet endeavor, I wrote back, thanked him and asked a few questions about his songwriting experience and songwriting style. He assured me that he and his cousins had started a kick ass alternative country band and, in fact, had already started working up the music for one of my lyrics. He talked the talk and so I decided to give it a shot. I marked the lyric as "claimed" on my web site and went about my business, certain I'd be getting a tape in the mail any day. Needless to say, it didn't happen that way. After a few weeks I began inquiring as to the status of our project. After several responses promising that the tape was in the mail, I gave up and put the lyrics back on the market. Later, I learned that Bill was just a kid, barely a teenager. No band, no music. Nothing but a vivid imagination. My first internet collaboration was something less than a success.

Like most songwriters, I co-write regularly with a number of other writers. Before Bill emailed his way into my memory, I had never read, much less used, a Collaboration Agreement. Most of the people I wrote with were good friends of mine. Some of them I've known all my life. We never thought about documenting our relationship and our rights in the songs we wrote. Most songwriters I know are like that. Many of them still don't use Collaboration Agreements. But with the advent of the internet and the new generation of songwriters who write together over the internet, sometimes without ever meeting the other writer face to face, the need set forth the parties' intentions and rights becomes more pressing. If all you know about someone is that they write like Ryan Adams and sing like Jeff Tweedy, it's hard to tell what his marketing preferences are for songs, or how willing he will be to spend money to promote the song. The easy way to learn all of this essential information is to propose a Collaboration Agreement.

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