I sold a song, but am I getting proper credit for writing it?

Being as in this case it isn't about the money but the bragging rights, I agree with others here saying she did you right by including you. Think Lennon McCartney...shit many times it was really one or the others "idea" but they agreed to call it a split because the end result WAS a mix of both artist contributions. You sold the rights to the song albeit unclear as to what you were selling. I would say she can do whatever she wants with it and absolutely take credit for her more elaborately produced version and contributions therein....Only if it were to get HUGE or be used in a movie or something would you need to split hairs over what your role was and in the end it seems you sold her the rights...so like McCartney who sold his and Michael Jackson who sold the rights to his...you get nada for a lump sum you accepted in the beginning...

As long as you're not on starving on skid row Chili's advice as to never sell the rights just a mechanical license to use is great advice for the future...
 
Considering everything, I have two things to say:
1. Congrats on selling a song! That's a big deal.
2. Your name being on it at all is a big plus for you.
OK I meant three.
3.If it becomes a well known HIT single, sue her for all she's worth regardless of the other facts.
 
I would think that if you sold the song, you have no further claims or rights of any kind over it. Did the purchase agreement include any clauses about songwriting credit or lyrics? If not, you probably sold your say when you sold your song.

Don't sell your songs.
 
I often tell people I do paperwork, and do contracts and agreements - but the truth is very often I don't. I get people on forums contact me and sometimes I volunteer to try to fix things if they send me stuff. Somebody sends me a cubase file that doesn't quite work and I'll change a chord or two, or perhaps inversions of chords so they flow, not jump - and I send them back. The basic question to me was can you X? I send it back and say how is Y? very often you get a thanks that's great or thanks but it's not quite what I had in mind and you move on. If two years later it became famous, I think I'd quite like the idea I had a hand in it, but I never promised anything nor did they. Sure - people get stiffed. That's how life works, but we make creative choices all the time. A few pounds, probably far less than it's really worth, or a promise of a cut of the profits that you know will never happen. With strangers who seek me out I tend to lay things out formally and properly, but with others, I'm happy helping with no promise of reward.

I've got a recording I made of somebody who is now very famous and on national radio. No money exchanged hands because when I recorded it, she was totally unknown. Now, I'd get a lawyers letter immediately if I made it public, let alone money! Musicians never have any money and always have huge expectations.
 
You wrote it. Lyrics AND melody. It doesn't matter if she changed whatever.
What she did fell into a simple change of arrangement.
UNLESS, you had an agreement otherwise.
What she did is commonly done, though...with an agreement.

Personally, I've taken songwriting credit for my contribution of production, but it was agreed upon beforehand.

I wouldn't sweat it.
 
partonkevin said:
You wrote it. Lyrics AND melody. It doesn't matter if she changed whatever.
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Huh? Of course it matters if she changed something. If the OP wrote a song about a purple people eater, and then she changed over 80% of the lyrics so that the story completely changed, then I would say the song would be co-written because it's indeed not the song the OP wrote anymore. Or what if all she did was use the chords the OP played but changed the melody entirely and wrote entirely new lyrics, then of course that matters. Now, if all she did was change a few instances of "she" to "he" or something, then I agree that's not worth claiming co-authorship.

The fact that she recorded it with a full band usually has nothing to do authoring credit. The only exception I could think of would maybe be if she (or someone else) contributed a very powerful instrumental hook or something that became one of the most recognizable aspects of the song. I'm thinking of maybe like the guitar intro to "Sweet Child O Mine" or the main guitar riff in Zeppelin's "Black Dog" or something. But to be honest, that's probably not even grounds for authorship unless it's agreed upon by both parties. I don't know for sure. That most likely falls under the realm of arrangement credit.

There are lots of shades of gray when it comes to what constitutes the "writing" of a song.

Even partonkevin's comment above demonstrates this. He said "You wrote it. Lyrics AND melody." But what about chords? Don't those matter, too? Think about "Desire" by U2. If all Bono did was come into rehearsal one day and say, "Check it out guys ... I have this great chorus idea. It goes like this: De - si - i - i - i - re! De - si - i - i - i - re!" And that's all he did, and then The Edge came in and said, "Cool. How about if we put these chords under it." And he plays the song's main chord hook (D - A - E), doesn't/shouldn't he get some songwriting credit?

(P.S. I've heard the story of that song, and I know that's not what happened. But I'm just saying it could have.)

Granted, that's not what happened here (I imagine ... unless the OP left out some details about chords being changed, etc.), but it just illustrates that things are not black and white when it comes to songwriting credit. If they were, there wouldn't be an entire industry built around copyright law.
 
if she's not making money off the song then who cares? she can claim she is a co-writer and you can claim she is full of shit and that you are the sole writer.
he said/she said.

Dosen't amount to a hill of beans if the song isn't generating substantial revenue.
 
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I didn’t sign anything when I sold it,...she just paid me, to buy it outright,
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What is the problem? She bought it OUT-RIGHT. That means it is not yours anymore. You are the one creating problems and she can sue you i you keep it up.

Outright means she can rewrite it. Its hers to do with what ever she wants. Why do you care, its not yours anymore.
 
IvyRose;4507911]Cliff notes- I sold my first song. I wrote the lyrics, and melody, (and played chords on guitar) and had recorded a video of me performing it on YouTube. From that, a few years later, I sell it. The person changed about 10 words...and sings one part of it different. (I.e. the last time through the chorus, she doesn’t sing one high note that I did.)
But she claims that she co-wrote it? It says written by: (her name), (my name). Is that right?


More to the story: She said that if she changed any words, that makes her a co-writer. Plus she did put thousands into getting a full band production, and she came up with a lot of that. (Mine was just me singing with my acoustic guitar) I think I should get credit for writing the song (lyrics and melody).
And she should get credit for performing and production. I didn’t sign anything when I sold it,...she just paid me, to buy it outright,...and she’s copywrited it. (I hadn’t, I just had it on YouTube)
Any thoughts please?!??

you sold it
it belongs to her
she doesnt even have to acknowledge you ever lived let alone wrote it as a WORK TO HIRE when you sold it outright

learn what IP law says - at least the very basics
and stop bellyaching
you got some money which is more than most people ever get
 
On our latest project, the idea was to sell the thing outright, but we just gave exclusive perpetual rights to use the material we produced for any purpose in any territory, but we kept the PRS and PPL so if for some strange reason it every got picked up outside the rather limited field out will be used for, we'll get the composers income, and the rights for the PPL side.
 
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