Music: What is compression and why does it matter?

Lately there has been quite a furore about the use of compression in music. I have been asked many times to explain what compression is and why anyone should care.

Very simply compression is a process applied to a music track. Once the music has been recorded many Producers decide to compress the music to boost quieter sections of the track nearer to the louder ones. This makes the overall volume (some might say noise!) of the track louder.

"Why do this"? you may ask. Well compression, applied sensibly, can be positive and some music stations, Classic FM for example, compress the music they play as they broadcast it so that people listening in noisier environments can still hear the very quiet parts of the music. For Classical music this can be good if you are driving or working in an office or warehouse where there is a lot of background noise. The purist however will turn to BBC3 safe in the knowledge that the channel does not compress their music and they can hear it as originally recorded.

We do not apply compression to our music and you can be sure that when you buy a Global Journey album that you are hearing it as it was played.

The Performing Rights Society (PRS)

The Performing Rights Society (PRS) are up to their old tricks again, calling small businesses with menaces and demanding payment for playing the radio as it is “providing entertainment”. Royalties should be paid to composers and songwriters and we should all accept and agree with this. However should we pay the composers and songwriters twice? After all when you listen to the music the radio station has already paid PRS for the performance, so why should you and everyone else where the radio can be heard by more than one person at a time? If you listen to CDs or legal downloads then the royalty has been paid in the purchase price of the disk or download.

 

PRS paid its top fat cat a salary of £425,000 in 2007, so before you think that perhaps the small time musician is entitled to a second bite of the cherry remember that much of the money collected goes to PRS salaries and admin costs.

 

If you have a small business and want to avoid paying PRS then you have options. Either play the radio for personal use only, ensuring that no-one else can hear it, or play PRS free music. Older classical music or music from companies such as Global Journey (the company I work for) sell music that it not registered with PRS. Play their music, even as in-store music for entertainment and you're in the clear. Don't forget that if you've got music on hold PRS will seek you out for that too, so change your hold music to royalty free music too!

Midem, the world's largest Music Fair was held in Cannes last week and in advance of it a report from the IFPI has disclosed that 95% of downloads are unauthorised with no payments to artists and producers. That figure may or may not surprise you but what should do is the fact from the same report that music purchases reached an all time high last year – up 10.5% in the US.

Non “digital” album sales are still 85% of the market in the US but considerably higher in other countries revealing that people still prefer buying albums on CD. Downloading is far more popular in the US than other countries and in the UK download sales of albums are still below 8% and lower still in France and Germany.

Although downloads are by far the most popular way to buy singles the opposite applies to albums. The death of the humble CD has been greatly exaggerated.

Bob Bruce
Global Journey

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