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The story
It was reported that on TV Tokyo’s “Sekai no Kyuyo Meisai” (World Payslips), Miki Fujimoto revealed that regarding the performance royalties she earned during her time in Morning Musume, “We sang a ton. Us too. But it was really… barely anything.” The revelation drew a flood of reactions on 5ch. The thread saw repeated explanations of the mechanics involved — that singing a song doesn’t earn an artist performance royalties at karaoke, since royalties only go to the lyricist and composer — with most comments focusing on how a group member’s share gets divided among everyone in the group, leaving each person with next to nothing. The discussion also expanded into comparing the vocal abilities of contemporaries like Ayaya Matsuura and Maki Goto, as well as the scale of CD sales back then.
Miki Fujimoto Opens Up About “Performance Royalties”: “We Sang So Much, Us Too” — Former Morning Musume Member Also Went Solo
TV Tokyo’s “Sekai no Kyuyo Meisai ~ How Does It Compare to Japan? ~” aired on the 4th, with Miki Fujimoto serving as MC.
It’s a variety show that investigates cost of living and customs around the world by showing viewers other people’s payslips.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
The group would've worked fine without you specifically too.
No wonder it was tiny.
Mikitty went solo and even performed at Kohaku (NHK's big New Year's Eve music special).
Singer-songwriters make the most money.
The only real Hello! Project success story is Erina Mano, who married [soccer player] Gaku Shibasaki 💦
I don't know about that…
Miki Fujimoto, Tsuji-chan, Maki Goto, Natsumi Abe, Ayaya, Mai Satoda —
that's a ton of names just off the top of my head!
Well yeah, because it's not even the original recording playing lol
I mean, it's the customer singing at karaoke, not the artist, right?
https://image.space.rakuten.co.jp/d/strg/ctrl/9/d5895bab125fc32b351899d28e718d6716ef05d1.11.2.9.2.jpeg
So she only got 4 million yen
She specifically picked Kikkoman [soy sauce]
and made do with one banana, and this is all she got?
for a 10-member group that's like 0.3 yen each
Streaming and TV/radio airplay pays about 1/10 of that — roughly 2500 yen per 1 million plays
split among the members that's just a few hundred yen
You don't make real money unless you write the lyrics and compose
There's no way karaoke pays out performance royalties
since the artist isn't the one singing
I remember a big-name singer based in the Kansai region saying on a local show once that performance royalties trickle in a few dozen yen at a time — and wondering if the processing fees cost more than the royalties themselves.
He could probably live off royalties alone, but is he still involved in making music?
Ayaya Matsuura was leagues ahead vocally
She was already polished from her debut single
"Dokki Doki Love Mail"
Listen to the live vocals from the trio unit "Gomattou" (a short-lived subunit) and anyone can hear the gap
There was a group with Gomaki and Ayaya, but one member felt seriously out of her league
I thought royalties only went to the lyricist, composer, and arranger
Would be nice if even 1 yen came in every time someone sang it at karaoke
Karaoke doesn't generate performance royalties
so even if it's "little" for a top idol group, they probably still made decent money
It's split among all the members, so each person's cut is small
do I really have to spell that out every single time? lol
but what's going on with whoever's grabbing the remaining 80-90%?
Half of it's retail and distribution, surely.
There's a pattern where the talent agency holds the publishing rights for pressing and selling the CDs, so that cut gets taken by them
Joji Takahashi reportedly handled everything himself, so he kept all the rights and made a killing off it
Was Ayaya Matsuura not actually that big of a seller?
CD sales might not have been huge, but she did a lot of commercials, so that's probably where the real money came from
Morning Musume during Fujimoto's time was in the 2003-2007 decline period, averaging around 100,000 CDs sold
no wonder there wasn't much money left over
I wonder if Nakazawa actually got a decent cut
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Music royalties are, properly speaking, a right paid to lyricists and composers based on CD or streaming sales, and the term “performance royalties” is easily misunderstood as money paid to the singer whenever the song is played at karaoke. The thread repeatedly explained that when a customer sings at karaoke, the artist earns nothing from it, and that even master recording royalties and usage fees are mostly distributed through publishing rights managed by the record label or talent agency. While a member was in the group, this share was split among everyone, so each individual’s take became very small. Opinions diverged on how to weigh the size of the CD market at the time — some argued “it was the CD golden age, so they must have earned well,” while others pointed out that “the period when Fujimoto was in the group (the mid-2000s) was already in a sales decline.” Comparisons of vocal ability and popularity among members remain a matter of personal opinion among fans, but the royalty system itself is worth understanding as basic knowledge of the music business.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News+) thread “[Entertainment] Miki Fujimoto Opens Up About ‘Performance Royalties’ — ‘We Sang So Much, Us Too. But It Was Really… Barely Anything’ Former Morning Musume Member Also Went Solo”.
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