How to license music for your YouTube video?

Music licensing may appear complicated, but it isn’t all that frightening. At least not as long as you aren’t a pirate looking to break the rules. And, hopefully, by the end of this article, you’ll be confident in your ability to license music for your YouTube. And the ability to find and use high-quality songs on your YouTube channel without incurring any copyright violations.

Music copyright exists to protect content creators like you. And music licensing is the process of obtaining permission from an artist to use their songs in your projects.

Whether you are using music for your video or you are creating your own, you need to know how to license music for your YouTube video. The first step is to find out if you can use a copyrighted song for your project. If you can, you should contact the musician and get permission to use it.

Steps for using licensed music for your video

A song is the result of an artist’s blood, sweat, and tears. Record labels put a lot of money into making that song. After that, legal teams (for the record label) must protect the song from infringement.

That means a dozen people could have a claim to a single song. And each person owns a portion of the song’s copyright. So, if you want to use copyrighted music legally on YouTube then,

Identify the copyright of a song

Using songs in YouTube videos can be risky if you do not know if a song is copyrighted. Luckily, there are ways to identify the copyright of a song and avoid a possible copyright strike.

One of the best ways to discover the copyright of a song is to use the Content ID system on YouTube. This feature allows music publishers to claim their intellectual property on YouTube and monetize videos.

Verify the copyright of a song

Using songs in your YouTube video is a risk. Unless you have permission from the copyright owner, you could be subject to a copyright strike. And your channel may even be deleted.

It’s important to understand copyright laws. Copyright law protects creators and ensures they are compensated for their work. This is where YouTube’s music policy comes in.

You don’t want to end up with tunes making millions for others. Your best bet is to license royalty-free music.

Get permission to use a copyrighted song from a famous musician

Using copyrighted music in a YouTube video can be risky unless you have permission from the owner of the song. Luckily, there are several ways you can obtain licensing from the copyright holder to use a song in your YouTube video.

You must first get permission from the original creator to legally use copyrighted content on YouTube, and one of the first places to do so is to start with a music publisher. Most professional music publishers belong to performing rights societies such as ASCAP and BMI. They can provide you with contact information for the copyright holder and can help you get a license.

You can also write a letter to your favorite musician asking for permission to use a copyrighted song in your YouTube video. If you’re a YouTuber who wants to make a music-related video, this can be a great way to gain exposure to your work.

Register your video as a copyrighted work with your country's Trademark Office

Whether you want to monetize your YouTube video or you just want to ensure your content isn’t used without your permission, registering your work with your country’s Trademark Office is a good idea. It’s like having an official birth certificate for your work. It shows the date of creation, notes the creator, and gives the owner a legal document to prove ownership.

You may have already seen videos on YouTube that claim ownership of the music or audio in the video. However, these videos have not registered their video or music with their country’s Trademark Office. If your video is using music or audio from another video, it’s important to know how to register your YouTube video as a copyrighted work with your country’s Trademark Office.

Is There a Different Way to Get Music for YouTube?

Fortunately, there is an alternative to dealing with traditional music licensing procedures. Instead of getting a license to use music for your YouTube video, you can instead use royalty-free music.

YouTube Royalty-Free Music has quickly become a popular trend among filmmakers because it bypasses the traditional music licensing model in favor of a process designed specifically to put high-quality music in the hands of content creators.

How it works.

A royalty-free music company will license a song from an artist and then sell it to content creators for a fraction of the price. So, instead of paying a high price for a song, you’ll pay a tiny amount for a license to use that song legally in a specific project.

You won’t have to send a portion of your revenue to copyright holders because there are no record labels involved. You will only have to pay for a license once.

Now, you are all set to start creating videos for YouTube with free non-copyrighted music.