Royalty Music is Priceless

Royalty Free Music is Priceless

Music is one of the most enjoyable things in life, and in movies, some of the most memorable scenes are made even more memorable through the songs that accompany them.  It is almost a cliché in the movie industry how Martin Scorsese takes every opportunity in his films to showcase his love of the song “Gimme Shelter” by the Rolling Stones, and who can blame him?  It’s such a great song.  And who can forget the awesome soundtrack to Pulp Fiction?

In the 80s, soundtrack music frequently topped the charts.  Against All Odds was a forgettable movie, but its theme song by Phil Collins continues to be sung in karaoke bars by people who weren’t even born when the film came out. Another example is St. Elmo’s Fire featuring classic hits like “Don’t you forget about me”. In the nineties, the movie Empire Records flopped big time yet created a monster soundtrack selling millions of copies.

These days, making videos is easier and less expensive than ever.  All you need is a reasonably intelligent mobile phone, and you can make one that gets viewed millions of times on YouTube.  You may be thinking about how your favorite songs could enhance your videos, but unlike the big movie studios, you don’t have the budget to pay the licensing fees to include copyrighted music in your videos.

Fortunately, there is plenty of free music that is in the public domain.  Unfortunately, most of it is unlistenable crap. (Did you ever think about the fact that almost all ice cream trucks play “Turkey in the Straw” because no one owns the copyright to it?)  Of course you’d be a turkey if you used that song for background music in today’s videos so you’ll need to find a better source than jingles from the 1900’s.

If you’re looking for some appropriate soundtrack music for your videos, whether you are making your video for a school project or whether it’s part of your bid to get your 15 minutes of fame on social media, check out one of the many Royalty Free Music libraries on the web.  Most are free, which means that anyone can use it for personal or educational use without having to acquire a license or pay royalties to the owner. It is not stealing and is perfectly legal thru Creative Commons licensing. All you do is copy and paste the song credit they provide to the end of your video. For those planning on making money on their commercial film or video, there’s a Royalty Free standard license which usually runs about $25 per song. It’s a cheap way to avoid copyright infringement plus you never have to pay royalties, even if your film wins an Oscar!

You might think that royalty free music for videos would all be boring or that the recordings would be poorly produced, but this is not the case at all.  It is true that most public domain music is classical but with royalty free music sites, classical is only part of the many categories of music you will find.  Choosing music for videos is one of the most fun and creative parts of video making; choosing the best free music out there without the risk of copyright violation is priceless!

Go to Royalty Free Music