interviews with library music producers - Philip Tagg

4 P Tagg: The Mood Music Libraries
ites. Some of the music we produce now is frankly quite good enough to go
out on commercial discs. Some of it is, I think, very way out, very exciting
and some of it is very big. I mean, we use the London Philharmonic Orchestra
for recordings sometimes…
About 100 musicians?
No, about 64 of them at a time, mainly the string section. A session like that
would cost us over £16,000 to record which is on a par with commercial productions,
although I’m not talking about the sort of production where they
spend months in the studio recording and mixing. We do it in two or three
days flat [record an LP]. Sorry, what was your question again?
Who started this library when and why?
Who started it? We’ve already dealt with that. When? I’m not sure of dates,
but the reason was to satisfy film people without them having to pay large
amounts in order to use music owned by standard composers.
So it wasn’t started as a direct consequence of the talkies in the thirties but
a later phenomenon?
Yes. Still, another important thing is the question of money, of company
budgets. You see, up to a few years ago most advertising agents and even
those just producing documentaries would be able to afford to got an orchestra
into the studio and record the backing track. It wasn’t very expensive
at all. But with the advent of strict union rules and rates, the rise of
studio costs and costs in general, the film or advertising budgets can afford
to record less and less of their own backing tracks. This is why background
libraries have become more and more useful — because of costs. Using library
music costs very little compared to having music scored, played end
recorded for a film or commercial. It can often even work better as well.
How large is your collection at present?
There are 300 or so LPs in the main library.
Do you sell the records in the collection or does your income come from royalties.
From royalties.
Who are your main customers?
Previously it was mainly people doing educational films, low-budget commercials
and so on, That changed and it became more and more a television
thing. At this stage it’s changing again. Although we still supply people with
music for their educational films, their documentaries, trade films and for
television. The big thing now is audiovisual presentations.
You mean slide shows, not videocassettes?
That’s right. Videocassettes are the newest problem. When the copyright
laws were brought in they didn’t conceive of videotape and certainly not
home video; this meant that apart from existing copyright law there are no
laws to putting music on videotape. No, what I mean by ‘audiovisual’ is
mainly presentations at exhibitions, for training staff, for demonstrating new
products: in other words the sort of presentation that travels round to various
places. There’s an enormous market for this because it doesn’t take as
much to set up as an audiovisual producer as it does to go into film. All you
need are a couple of recorders and slide projector and you’re in business.
As far as our income here is concerned in connection with audiovisual, what