A brand commissions a piece of music, approves it, pays the invoice, and runs the film. Everyone involved believes the brand owns the music. Quite often the paperwork says something narrower, and nobody finds out until the campaign is extended, cut into a new edit, or run in another country.
Paying for the work is not the same as acquiring the copyright
Section 17 makes the author the first owner of copyright. There is an exception for work made in the course of employment, but a composer engaged for a campaign is almost never an employee. They are engaged under a contract for service rather than a contract of service, and the exception does not reach them.
So ownership moves only if it is moved deliberately. Section 19 is the clause that does it, and it asks for two things that are easy to skip: the assignment must be in writing, and it must be signed by the assignor. A purchase order is not an assignment. An email saying the track is approved is not an assignment.
There are at least two copyrights in any piece of music
This is the part that catches people who have only ever bought one thing at a time. The composition is one work. The recording of that composition is a different work, with its own author and its own owner.
The author is defined separately for each class, so the two are rarely the same person. An assignment naming only the recording leaves the composition sitting with whoever wrote it, and an assignment naming only the composition leaves the master behind. Both have to be named.
The two clauses that shrink a licence when nobody writes them
If a deed is silent on duration and territory, the Act does not treat the silence as generosity. It fills both gaps, and it fills them narrowly.
- Section 19(5). No period stated, and the assignment is deemed to last five years from the date it was made.
- Section 19(6). No territory stated, and it is presumed to extend to India only.
Neither is a technicality. A sonic identity commissioned for a brand and meant to last is worth very little if the assignment behind it quietly ended in its fifth year, and a campaign that travels is exposed the moment it runs outside India on a deed that never mentioned anywhere else.
Both are easy to fix. State the term and state the territory on the face of the document, in the document itself rather than in the covering email.
The royalty share that cannot be bought
Section 18 carves out a writer’s right to a share of royalties and makes it non-waivable, so it is not something a commission can purchase however the fee is described. The Act treats different kinds of use differently here, and the right routes through the copyright society rather than through the client, so the correct handling depends on how the music is actually being used. It is worth settling explicitly in the agreement rather than discovering later.
What to ask for, in practice
- An assignment in writing, signed by everyone who wrote or recorded the music
- Both the composition and the sound recording named, not one of them
- The term stated, or section 19(5) makes it five years
- The territories stated, or section 19(6) makes it India only
- The media and uses covered, including cuts, edits and future versions
- Confirmation that anything not originally created for you, a sample or a library cue, is cleared for the use you intend
None of this is exotic. It is the same paperwork a label does for its own catalogue, which is why it tends to be in place when the music comes from someone who releases records and absent when it comes from someone who does not.