Song and recording are two different things
Every track you release is really two pieces of property. There's the song (the composition: melody, lyrics, chords, structure) and there's the recording (this particular performance of it, captured and mixed). They earn money through different routes and often pay different people.
Song money comes from things like radio play, streams, live performance and sync, collected by performing rights and mechanical societies and paid to writers and their publishers. Recording money comes from streams and sales via your distributor, plus neighbouring rights when the recording is broadcast, and goes to whoever owns the master and the performers on it.
So when someone says "we split it 50/50", the first question is: split what? A session guitarist might have no song share at all but a fair claim on the recording. A topliner who never touched the final mix might hold a large song share and nothing on the master. Agree both, separately.
| Role | Typical song share | Typical recording share |
|---|---|---|
| Topline and lyrics | Often a large slice | Only if they perform on it |
| Producer who builds the beat | Often a writer share | Often "points" on the master |
| Featured artist | If they write their verse | Usually a negotiated share |
| Session player | Rarely, unless they write a part | Fee, or a small share |
| Mix or mastering engineer | Almost never | Usually a fee; sometimes a point |
Treat the table as a map of habits, not a rulebook. Plenty of crews do it differently, and that's fine as long as everyone agrees.
Who counts as a writer
A writer is someone who contributed to the song itself: the parts that would survive if you played it on an acoustic guitar in a kitchen. That usually includes the topline melody, the lyrics, and the musical bed when it's integral to the song: a beat, a riff or a chord progression the track is built around.
Grey areas are normal. Someone suggests the chorus should drop to the relative minor and it transforms the song. Someone else spends three hours on hi-hat programming that nobody would notice on a piano. The first person may well have written something; the second probably produced something. Neither instinct is a formula.
A split is an agreement between people, not a measurement. The goal isn't to be scientifically precise. It's for everyone to walk out feeling it was fair.
Some useful questions to ask in the room:
- Would the song still be recognisably this song without that contribution?
- Did it come from this session, or was it brought in already finished?
- Is it a part of the composition, or a choice about how it sounds?
- Did the person contribute to the whole song or one section of it?
Common starting points
There's no standard split, but there are a few conventions people reach for. Pick the one that feels closest and adjust from there.
- Equal split. Everyone who was in the room writing gets the same share, regardless of who did what. Popular with bands and regular writing teams because it removes the argument entirely, and it tends to even out across a catalogue.
- By contribution. Split the song into its parts, often lyrics and music, and divide each part among the people who wrote it. More work up front, but it can feel fairer when contributions are lopsided.
- Producer points. On the recording side, producers often take a percentage of the master ("points") on top of or instead of a fee. How many points varies a lot by genre, budget and bargaining power.
Here's how that can look in practice. Four people write a song in an afternoon: Marlow writes most of the lyrics and the topline, Kofi builds the beat and the chords, Tess plays a guitar riff the whole track hangs on, and Ama comes in later to write and record a guest verse. An equal split would give each of them 25% of the song. A by-contribution split might land closer to Marlow 35%, Kofi 30%, Tess 20% and Ama 15%. Neither is wrong. What matters is that all four can live with the answer, and that they've also agreed the recording separately, where Kofi might hold producer points and Tess a performer share.
When to agree: in the session
The best time to agree a split is at the end of the session where the song was written, while everyone still remembers who came up with the hook and before the track has any money attached to it. Everyone is generous when a song is a demo. Everyone remembers differently once it's charting.
It doesn't have to be awkward. Make it part of how the session ends, the same way you'd bounce a rough mix or label the project folder. Whoever booked the room, or the engineer, can start the sheet so it never feels like one writer is pushing for a number. A simple "shall we sort the split before we go?" does most of the work.
If someone contributed remotely, by sending a beat, a stem or a voice note, agree with them as soon as their part makes it into the song, not when it's mastered. The longer it waits, the more the memory of who did what starts to drift.
If the song changes later (a new verse, a feature, a rewrite of the bridge), update the split then too. A sheet from March that doesn't include the person who wrote the chorus in June isn't much help.
What to write down
A split sheet doesn't need to be fancy. It needs to be complete, and everyone needs a copy. At minimum, record:
- The song title, any working titles, and the date of the session
- Every contributor's artist name and legal name
- Each writer's society, publisher (if any) and writer ID, such as an IPI number
- Each person's role: lyrics, topline, music, production, performance
- Song shares as percentages adding up to 100%
- Recording shares, separately, also adding up to 100%
- A signature and date from every person listed
The legal names and writer IDs are the bit people skip, and they're the bit that decides whether money actually reaches you. Societies match registrations on names and IDs. A nickname and no number is how royalties end up unclaimed.
When someone disagrees, or changes their mind
It happens. Someone remembers a session differently, or a collaborator's manager gets involved months later. A few things help:
- Separate the shares. If one person's share is disputed, there's no reason to stop everyone else being paid. Hold the disputed slice and pay the rest.
- Go back to the record. Session dates, voice notes, project files and message threads are all useful evidence of who did what and when.
- Change it properly. If you agree a new split, write a new version and have everyone sign it again. Keep the old one; don't edit over it.
- Get help early. If it's going nowhere, a mediator, your society or a lawyer is cheaper than a falling-out.
How TrackLedger helps
We built TrackLedger because we'd watched too many good tracks stall on this. You start a split sheet in the session, add everyone with their roles, and send it round. Each person signs their share on their phone, with no app or account needed. Once it's signed, TrackLedger registers the song and recording, puts the credits on a public page and pays everyone their share on the 1st of each month, in their own currency.
If a share is disputed or unsigned, it waits in a holding pen while everyone else gets paid. If you want to test a few starting points first, the split calculator lets you try equal, by-contribution and producer-points splits side by side.
