Music Royalties Explained: How Artists Get Paid for Their Work

When you stream a song on Spotify or hear it in a coffee shop, someone gets paid—that’s a music royalty, a payment made to the owner of a musical work when it’s used commercially. Also known as royalty income, it’s how songwriters, performers, and producers earn money long after they’ve recorded their track. It’s not just about sales anymore. Today, most royalties come from streaming, radio, TV shows, and even background music in stores.

There are different types of music licensing, the legal permission to use a song in public or commercial settings. One kind goes to the writer of the lyrics and melody—that’s the publishing rights, the ownership of the song’s composition, separate from the recording. Another kind goes to the artist who recorded it—that’s the streaming royalties, payments from platforms like Spotify or Apple Music based on how many times a track is played. And if your song is used in a movie or ad, there’s a separate fee for that too. These aren’t guesses or guesses—they’re tracked, calculated, and paid out by organizations like ASCAP, BMI, or PRS.

Most people think if you’re the singer, you get all the money. But that’s rarely true. A single hit song can involve five or six people getting paid: the lyricist, the composer, the producer, the lead vocalist, the backing musicians, and sometimes even the label. And if you’re an independent artist? You might need to register your own publishing rights to even see a dime. Many musicians miss out because they don’t know how to claim what’s theirs.

What you’ll find in this collection aren’t dry contracts or legal jargon. These are real stories—how a college student earned $2,000 from a TikTok sound, why a producer didn’t get paid for years, how a folk singer in Kerala made royalties from a song played in a German documentary. These posts break down the messy, real-world system behind the music you love—and show you exactly who gets paid, and how.