Under the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994, music writers and the owners of the recordings of that music have a number of rights which allow them to control how and when their music is used and to negotiate payment for this use.
These rights include:
The right to perform music in public, (e.g. by playing a CD, radio, TV or by a live performance)
The right to communicate music to the public, (e.g. a radio or television broadcast, via a music on hold system or to make available for download)
The right to reproduce music, (e.g. copy music to CDs or other recording devices, such as an iPod)
Because it is difficult or impossible to obtain permission from every copyright owner prior to performing, communicating or reproducing their music, OneMusic has been established to provide a link between music users and creators and producers of the music. OneMusic is a joint licensing initiative between APRA (who represent music writers and publishers) and Recorded Music NZ (who represent record companies and recording artists). Our role is to administer the rights of our members (i.e. a worldwide repertoire of music writers, publishers and record companies) and enable you to play music in public by taking one simple licence.
If you perform or communicate music to the public, or reproduce music, you need to obtain a OneMusic licence to comply with the New Zealand Copyright Act 1994.
Simply buying music does not provide the rights to use this music in a commercial or public setting. Music is sold for private/domestic use, so any use of this music by a business or organisation is a public performance that requires licensing. The same rule applies whether you have purchased a physical CD, bought a digital download or stream music through a subscription service.
Through APRA and Recorded Music NZ, OneMusic holds reciprocal agreements with similar organisations and rights holders around the world. In practice this means that OneMusic collects royalties for the use of other countries’ music in New Zealand, and they collect royalties for the use of our members’ music in their countries. Through these agreements OneMusic represents a vast repertoire of music from around the world. If you believe you only play music that is outside the OneMusic repertoire please contact us on 0800 800 663 so we can confirm this with you.