EMI To Offer Amnesty Period To Artists Over Unauthorised Sampling

Artists and producers with a penchant for using samples in their music will have six months to gain proper clearance from London-based music business EMI Production Music for using sample elements of their songs, before the company starts to take action on unauthorised use, it has been reported.

According to Billboard, the Sony/ATV Music Publishing-owned company will from today, 1 September, offer a first-of-its-kind amnesty to musicians who have "knowingly or unknowingly" used samples from EMI's Production Music library — a voluminous body of tunes compiled over more than 60 years and 125,000 master recordings — "to gain a licence without risk of legal action or an expensive royalty back claim".

"If you look at the length of time now that sampling has been in place in pop music and look at the depth of our catalogue, there's probably a fair few samples that go unrequested out there," EMI Production Music global director Alex Black told Billboard.

"All we're trying to do here is say: 'Let's engage.'

"Let's work with the record and artist community that we think are interested in sampling, or have sampled our catalogue, and see if we can do something positive that might well stimulate new and exciting collaborations."

The amnesty — which will not cover samples already in discussion for clearance or those that are not voluntarily brought forward by their artists — will extend to samples taken from specialist production-music (i.e. TV, film, games) libraries including, Billboard reports, KPM, Music House, Selected Sound, Colour Sound, AV Music, Castle Music, Ded Good and Sparkle & Burn. Notably, the KPM library has been used (with authorisation) by several high-profile artists, including Mark Ronson, Gorillaz, Gnarls Barkley, Jay Z, Ghostface Killah and Nelly, among others.

"Our aim is to create an awareness that what we have here is a catalogue that has amazing depth and richness to it," Black told Billboard, having indicated that those interested in legitimately using their material would find the company "open to clearing [such use] at a very competitive rate".

"It's a positive for everyone. It benefits our composers, the labels and any artists wishing to sample our catalogue."

As something of a bonus, that catalogue just got a lot larger — or at least more easily obtainable — after EMI digitised a number of tracks, previously only available on vinyl, that were recorded in the 1960s and '70s, to be searchable using their online engine.