John,

The publisher and the writer would share in copyrights. That is what publishing is. There are two halfs of a song. The publishers share and the writer's share. It could be looked at as the "Business office" and the "Creative department."

The writer is responsible for all manner of the creative process, from writing the song, getting it recorded, anything that involves the creation and presentation of that work.
You cannot (Legally) "Sell" or giveaway that portion of a work.

The publisher is the administrative arm of the partnership. It is involved in exploiting the business possibilities of the song. It spends times with the business side of the industry,record labels, producers,artists, PRO's, etc. Anything that possibly could represent income, radio, live performance, ring tones,movie and film liscencing, songs for video games, toys etc. Anywhere a song is liscenced.

It is a world of Minutia, (try hiring a $500 an hour lawyer to collect your thirty five dollars from the country of Greece, a socialist country. YOU try collecting from a government.)it is a world of frustration ("No thanks, we are not listening any more for this project" after waiting three months for an appointment) and it is a world of years and a LOT of money making contacts that open those doors. Everything is on reputation.

Publishers generally approach everything on a song by song basis. If they hire a writer for a staff job, they don't take all the songs the writer has. A writer usually has a quota, 12-15 songs a year. But that is on the onus of the publisher on what they accept. And the contract would be for 100% ownership of songs. But that has a caveat.

For political reasons, as well as talent reasons, you co-write almost everything. Would you rather to pitch a song about falling in love with a Hollywood actress and trying to be a guitar player on the road that you don't really know that much about, since you have never been married to a Hollywood actress, and the closest thing you have been to the "road" would have been a trip to Miami with your family when you were twelve?

Or would you rather have written that song with Brad Paisley,who is married to a Hollywood actress and plays guitar on the road?

Which one do you think will achieve more credibility?

So you are going to co-write, particularly with artists. That means for that 12 songs, you now have to turn in at least 24 songs. Since they only take about one in 4 songs, that means you have to write 30-40-50, etc. Expand that to three writers, and multiple publishers and your share decreases with each one added.

A publisher is only going to share in the copyright of the songs he or she is personally involved in business wise.

There are a lot of different deals and they can get weird.

I used to be like everyone and thought I had to have copyrights on everything. Then I moved to Nashville. When you hear almost every concievable subject, every concievable twist,every concievable melody, and EVERYTHING sounds like something else,then when you hear the "big dogs" do it, especially on a writer's night, you see the difference immediately. You stop making a big deal on copyrights.

My take is that they happen when they are supposed to. When you get actual publishing interest in a song or a writer,it can be months before anything actually happens. When you are talking about songs being released into the public, it can take years.

No one is going to release anything without all kinds of legal stuff being done first. That requires lawyers and meetings. And more lawyers and meetings.

I signed a half dozen songs to SONY on Frankie Ballard a year ago. Each contract is about 12 pages long and covers all kinds of stuff from sync liscences to ring tones and everything in between. None of those songs are currently out on the charts. The record label is doing what all labels are doing right now, releasing one single at a time. So it may be a while before anything gets out there. In the meantime I write more songs work with more people, do my job every day giving long answer to questions for you guys.

So all of this copyright stuff to me is premature. First write a lot of songs. Then for the few that are worth copyrighting and have interest, copyright. But in anything don't expect a lot of satisfaction. We are in a day and age where rappers take existing tracks and put their own lyrics to them. Where people use whatever song they want for whatever they want to use it for with no permission at all on You Tube videos. Where politicians are following that logic that all creative work should be free and opposing us in the halls of Congress and the Parliments of countries worldwide.

With all the things going on in music, getting a piece of paper that says something is protected is kind of the equivalant of someone yelling "halt" and "stay in line" at a 5:00 am Walmart Christmas sale. Yeah, someone may hear you say something. But whether anyone really cares or not is another matter.

MAB