Reading the Contract You Are About to Sign

Most artists sign their first label deal without reading it carefully: the terminology is dense, the implications are long-term and the asymmetry between a first-time artist and an experienced label is significant. This workshop aims to close this gap. As part of ‘Reading the Contract You Are About to Sign’ a music lawyer will walk attendees through a redacted real-world label contract and explain every clause that matters. They will deep dive into all relevant details from term length, territory and royalty calculation to recoupment and advances and everything that lies in between. This is a working session not a lecture so attendees should come equipped with questions and even a contract to work through with the lawyer in real time. Attendees can expect to leave with contract-reading vocabulary and a checklist they can apply the next time a deal arrives.