Kavelle Anglin-Christie, Staff Reporter

Singing Melody said he was told payment would be in December and he is expecting a call anytime now. - Winston Sill/Freelance Photographer

A few Jamaican artistes should soon have long-awaited royalty cheques in hand.

Several months ago SoundExchange, an overseas royalty distribution company, was attempting to contact a number of Jamaican artistes to issue back royalties. They included Eek-a-Mouse, Burro Banton, Big Youth, Singing Melody, Sizzla, The Abyssinians Ellis, Yellowman, Mystic Revealers and Millie Small. Nicodemus, who is now dead, was also on the list of those who could collect.

According to the organisation's website, soundexchange.com, it takes 90 working days to process an application. SoundExchange's executive director, John Simson, told The Sunday Gleaner, "We try to expedite when we can, but there are so many artistes registering. But sometimes, we go quicker than that (90 days); it just depends. We have to check all the details, because we don't want to be paying money to the wrong people. It's easier when you have personal contact with the people, rather than getting a phone call saying 'I'm so and so'."

Willem Dicke, SoundExchange's communications director, said the quarter in which the artistes get paid depends on their registration date.

Issued every quarter

"There is a little time in between and they also don't get the royalties immediately because they are issued every quarter. To know which distribution they would be eligible for depends on when they were registered," he said.

The website informs that "SoundExchange Inc. ... (has) hundreds of recording companies and thousands of artistes united in receiving fair compensation for the licensing of their music in the new and ever-expanding digital world. Modern technology makes all of our lives a little bit simpler and SoundExchange takes full advantage of its accuracy and efficiency to license, collect and distribute public performance revenues for sound recording copyright owners (SRCOs) and artistes for non-interactive digital transmissions on cable, satellite and webcast services.

"Prior to 1995, SRCOs in the United States did not have a performance right. This meant that, unlike their counterparts in most of Europe and other nations around the world, recording companies and artistes were not entitled to receive payment for the public performance of their works. Users of music, the digital music service providers, freely performed these works at will, without a dime being paid to the rightful owners of those recordings or the featured artistes who performed the songs - the recordings which created the backbone of their business."

Not aware of SoundExchange

In a story ('A 'SoundExchange' of cash') that was originally published in the The Sunday Gleaner, neither Singing Melody nor Big Youth knew about the company, nor did they know they were being sought.

As the situation now stands, Big Youth said "We signed up some papers. It is going through my lawyers and we are still waiting to see what it happening."

"Yes, I followed up on it. They (SoundExchange) have my documents," Singing Melody said. He said he was not sure how long the process would take. "They had said it would be December, but hopefully, everything gets sorted out soon. I am expecting a call or something anytime soon," he said.

Some ofthe persons on the current list include producer 'Fattis' Burrell, Leroy Smart, Patra and Richie Stephens, while holdovers from the previous list are Millie Small and Nicodemus.

kavelle.christie@gleanerjm.com