Music creators’ incomes reach pre-pandemic levels

According to the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers (CISAC), music creators’ incomes grew by 26% in 2022, helping them recover to pre-COVID-19 levels. Streaming has become the largest source of income for music creators. The increase in revenue was also facilitated by concerts that began to be actively held all over the world after anti-Covid restrictions were lifted.

The CISAC report entitled Global Collections Report is dedicated to the situation with the income of authors and composers; data for the report was received by the confederation of 225 societies of authors in 116 countries. It is reported that at the end of 2022, the total income of authors and composers amounted to €12.1 billion, an increase of 26.7% compared to the previous year. Thus, as CISAC notes, they have recovered to pre-pandemic levels. At the same time, the volume of royalties even exceeded the level of 2019 by 19.8%.

The income of authors and composers comes from three sources: digital sales and streaming, broadcasts (radio and TV) and concert performances. The largest source in 2022 was digital sources (€4.2 billion), an increase of 33% compared to the previous year. They overtook the previous leader – broadcasts, which last year brought creators €4.1 billion with an increase of only 11%.

For the entire music industry, including record labels, performers, and so on, streaming became the largest source of revenue at the end of 2017.

The highest growth was shown by the dynamics of income from concerts and other live performances, which began to actively take place around the world last year after the lifting of coronavirus restrictions. Growth compared to the previous year was 69.9% – up to €2.7 billion. CISAC notes that “after almost three years of turmoil due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the dynamics of copyright income has returned to normal progressive growth in each subsequent year.”

“Last year’s data shows that our industry’s collective governance system has been able to adapt to new conditions, despite all the challenges it has faced,” said CISAC President Björn Ulvaeus, a musician, performer and producer, former member of ABBA. “And this is all good news. Because everything we see now, after COVID-19 and the difficult economic situation, is a new existential challenge, I mean the growing influence of artificial intelligence. AI will radically change the world of authors and the entire creative industry. It will require attention from the international community and representatives of the entire creative industry,” added Bjorn Ulvaeus.

According to the IFPI (International Federation of Phonographic Industry) report, the music industry grew 9% in 2022 to reach $26.2 billion.

The main growth driver was subscriptions to streaming services (+10.3% – up to $12.7 billion), and the leading regions were Central and Southern Africa (+34.7%), Latin America (+25.9%), as well as Western Asia and North Africa (+23.8%). There is no data for Russia in the IFPI report. According to InterMedia, in 2022 the decline in the music streaming market was 30–50%, to approximately 5–7 billion rubles. (see “Kommersant” dated February 6).

Evgeniy Khvostik, Yulia Yurasova