Some 20,000 works composed by popular musicians including The Eagles, Pharrell Williams, Boston, Foreigner, John Lennon, Smokey Robinson, Chris Cornell, and George and Ira Gershwin could soon be removed from YouTube - just as the Google streaming giant launches it's YouTube Music Key, it's much-anticipated subscription service that will compete with Spotify and Pandora. why? Well band manager, ex Live Nation chief and now boss of Global Music Rights (GMR) Irving Azoff (right) has told The Hollywood Reporter that he is prepared to take 42 of his clients away from YouTube. Azoff had already fired a shot accross the bows of US music colleciton societies BMI and ASCAP saying "The way fans listen to music is evolving daily" adding "GMR is going to give songwriters and publishers an opportunity to engage in meaningful licensing for their intellectual property. The trampling of writers' rights in the digital marketplace without any regard to their contribution to the creative process will no longer be tolerated."
Both Ryan Tedder and Pharrell Williams have signed up to a new performing rights body called Global Music Rights, which is part of the new entertainment company set up by one time Live Nation chief Irving Azoff and it is expected that Williams will leave ASCAP by October 1st this year. The Global Music Rights roster is expected to encompass between 30 and 60 writers, with about half of them expected to be drawn from the Azoff Music Management portfolio and GMR willl represent them in the performing rights area.
