The Bizarre History of The Beatles Publishing Royalties – McCartney’s 50 Year Struggle To Regain His Rights
Paul McCartney and John Lennon did not receive a single penny of their compositional royalties for nearly 50 years. It is now a valuable lesson to all artists on the importance of Publishing Rights and how to hold onto them.
Seen as one of the largest legal battles in music history that was finally resolved in 2017, you can bet that Paul McCartney and Yoko Ono (as Lennon’s beneficiary) are holding tight to the publishing rights on The Beatles’ new hit track ‘Now And Then’ that was released early November.
To fully understand what happened to the Beatles publishing rights and why they lost ownership, we need to go back and look at the first Beatles album (LP) ‘Please Please Me’.
The creation of the Northern Songs company
After the release of their debut album in 1963, the manager of the Beatles Brian Epstein sought out a publisher for all songs written by Lennon and McCartney. This led to a partnership with Dick James who began the company Northern Songs to look after all the Beatles publishing royalties.
The company was mostly owned by Dick James with Lennon and McCartney each owning 20% of the company.
By 1965 the company had become public and the shares diminished further for Lennon and McCartney with a 15% cut each. George Harrison and Ringo Starr split a small percentage between themselves – much to the annoyance of George Harrison who had begun to take a significant role in Beatles songwriting.
The passing of Epstein and sold off shares
In 1967, Brian Epstein passed away and relationships between the Beatles began to strain due to money issues, creative differences and lack of management.
This escalated further in 1969 when the relationship between the Beatles and Dick James soured and Northern Songs Company shares owned by Dick James and Brian Epstein were sold to ATV Music.
According to the podcast ‘Questlove Supreme’, Steve Miller (of Steve Miller Band) was present when McCartney found out their publisher had sold his shares through a newspaper.
With the Beatles suffering financial difficulties, they were unable to outbid ATV Music for control of their own publishing. They also sold their own shares in their publishing to ATV Music.
This meant none of the compositional royalties of the Beatles went to any of the Beatles after 1969.
ATV Music, Michael Jackson and Sony Music
Over a decade passed with ATV Music in full ownership of the Beatles publishing. Until 1985, the owner of ATV Music decided to sell the company and therefore the publishing catalogues of multiple artists including the Beatles.
Although McCartney attempted to buy back his shares, he was outbid by ‘The King of Pop’ Michael Jackson.
Michael Jackson earned all the publishing royalties of all the Beatles catalogue until 1995 where he sold 50% of ATV Music to Sony Music and they entered a joint ownership.
By 2006 Michael Jackson began to face bankruptcy and struck a new deal with Sony and sold a further 25% of his shares which were held by the Jackson Estate until 2016 – 7 years after Michael Jackson’s death.
A Beatle Regains Ownership
With the Jackson Estate selling their remaining shares to Sony Music in 2016, McCartney began to strike.
The US Copyright Act of 1976 stated that songwriters are able to retain their publishers’ share on compositions released before 1978 after a 56 year period. McCartney filed for ownership of 32 songs by the year of 2018 – which was 56 years after the release of the Beatles first albums.
However, as this was a US based copyright law, it did not apply to works written in the UK – making the lawsuit even more difficult for McCartney and his lawyers.
Luckily, Sony Music not wanting to face the lawsuit agreed a private settlement with McCartney although few details on what was involved have emerged since.
After 50 years of McCartney fighting for their publishing rights, it has finally closed to an agreement both parties are happy with.
Yoko Ono entered an agreement with Sony Music on behalf of John Lennon due to a law allowing songwriter’s heirs being able to claim in their name if a songwriter is to die within 28 years of writing the song. Meaning Yoko Ono will continue to retain control of Lennon’s royalties until 2050.
The importance of Publishing Royalties and making sure you protect them
With Publishing Royalties being understood and spoken about more every year, modern musicians are aware of the importance of letting trustworthy companies and labels manage their money.
At RouteNote Publishing, we collect worldwide publishing royalties and make sure our users are informed and protected. Our service is free and we only take 15% of your publishing royalties for administration, leaving you with 85% of your share.
We are also happy to answer any publishing related questions, so users don’t enter any dodgy deals and always gain the most out of their compositions.