June 2021
Dear Songwriter, Composer and Publisher,
As the country reopens, all of us at BMI hope this letter and distribution find you and your loved ones doing well. While BMI has advocated for the value of music and protected copyright for more than 80 years, we have never been prouder of our affiliates than we have in the last 15 months. The unprecedented pandemic impacted everyone, but especially affected your livelihoods, yet you continued writing incredible music that inspired and united us all during one of the most challenging times in history. Our sincerest thanks for everything you’ve done, and continue to do, to keep moving us all forward with your exceptional talent and creativity.
With federal and local restrictions easing, we’re very encouraged by what this means for music creators and performance opportunities. You may have seen that Lollapalooza announced that it is returning this summer in-person, and BMI is very excited to once again have a stage there. We also hope to get back to our schedule of other festival events, pending restrictions and CDC guidelines, which we have followed since last March. It will be great to see all of you, listen to your music in-person and catch up!
In addition, after such a tumultuous year, I’m extremely pleased to share that this distribution is the largest in BMI’s history, due to the extraordinary demand for your music. During this time, we’ve also continued to enhance our service to you, from accelerating royalty payments during the pandemic, to improving our distribution schedule, and beyond. As previously mentioned, starting in 2022 our quarterly distributions will be evenly spaced apart every three months so that there is one distribution per calendar quarter, each February, May, August and November. As a reminder, to prepare for the new schedule we will add a one-time fifth distribution in November of 2021, which is in addition to the regularly scheduled September distribution. When our new schedule is implemented in 2022, your royalties will be delivered about one month faster from performance to payment overall.
In addition to your usual royalties, this distribution includes retro payments from 2020 for Amazon Music Unlimited and Amazon Prime Music, as well as 2019 payments for Slacker and Tik Tok, if eligible. Similarly, those to whom it applies will see second and third quarter 2020 payments for Peacock, third and fourth quarter 2020 payments for Shudder, and third and fourth quarter 2020 payments for Sundance Now. As a reminder, you will receive your royalties more quickly and safely when you sign up for direct deposit.
Finally, BMI’s online award show tributes continued this quarter and we were privileged to honor our Latin Award winners, Pop Award winners, Trailblazers of Gospel Music Award honorees, as well as our Student Composer Award winners. Additionally, the industry recognized many BMI affiliates. Kudos go out to our BRIT Award winners, Rock Hall of Fame inductees and Americana Honors & Award nominees. BMI was also excited to salute Jazz Appreciation Month and Black Music Month, and we were very proud to recognize Asian American & Pacific Islander Heritage Month and Pride Month, honoring the diversity among our outstanding affiliates. We’re looking forward to our upcoming online celebrations of BMI’s Film, TV & Visual Media Awards, Christian Awards and R&B/Hip-Hop Awards. It’s such a pleasure to pay tribute to your amazing success and achievements.
In the meantime, be well, take care, and have a great summer!
Sincerely,
Mike O'Neill
President and Chief Executive Officer