, Columnist
Katy Perry’s $225 Million Payday Began in 1908
The rights to mechanically reproduced music used to belong to no one.
Singing all the way to the bank.
Photographer: Chris Jackson/Getty ImagesThis article is for subscribers only.
Katy Perry sold the rights to most of her music for a cool $225 million last month to Litmus Music. It’s the latest in a series of high-profile payouts. Tempted by eye-popping offers from investment firms like Hipgnosis and Shamrock Capital, Paul Simon, Dr. Dre and other artists have sold out — literally.
While the scale of these transactions may be unprecedented, they’ve been a long time coming. These deals are the consummation of a revolution that began over a century ago when music copyright first began its improbable metamorphosis from a limited legal claim to something that can be monetized on a mass scale.