Category: Glossary

Bumper

The term “bumper” and its synonyms “opener” or “showopener” means a short audio logo without a following music bed in the context of radio broadcasting. It is played regularly to open a broadcast or rubric. Through the bumper the current program is being closed on the one hand, and on the other hand, it helps getting back the attention of the viewers by its recognition value. Thus bumpers help structuring the program flow.

Typical applications for bumpers are newscasts, traffic message channel and weather.

Closer / Stinger

A “closer” or “stinger” is the antonym to “bumper” and “opener” in the world of radio broadcasting. Jingles are called “closer”, if they end a moderation. “Stingers” are often used in never-ending loops like music beds for announcements. At the end of the announcement a stinger is played for to signalise the viewer acoustically the end of the part in a content.

An example: During a radio newscast a report of a correspondent is inserted. At the end of the report a closer or stinger is used for that. The viewer realises the change back to the studio.

CELAS

Under the name CELAS the german collecting society GEMA (Gesellschaft für musikalische Aufführungs- und mechanische Vervielfältigungsrechte) and the british MCPS-PRS (Mechanical Copyright Protection Society – Performing Right Society) Alliance offer since january 2007 a conjointly licensing possibility for music repertoire of the EMI Music Publishing company. The particularity of the CELAS is the unique possibility to acquire a pan-european license for the repertoire of the major EMI Music Publishing. The CELAS shall at this become the main point of contact for transnational online licensing.

Music Briefing

Music briefing is to work out the specifications of the music tracks needed for a project, e.g. film, spot, commercials. An example for a project in this context might be a briefing for the music creation of an advertising spot.

The music briefing usually consists of two parts:

1. Specifications about the product and surroundings, in which context the music shall be inserted. (Music briefing in the broader sense)

This specifications define the promotional surroundings, the desired emotionality, the target group, the application area (which medium is used) and the core elements of the brand strategy.

2. Specifications regarding musical attributes. (Music briefing in a narrower sense)

Those might be original musical attributes like the atmosphere, the arrangement, the character, tempo and instrumentation. In this process it is not unusual to use so calles temp tracks – well known productions – to define moods, characters and other attributes to produce a sounds-like-composition.

Based on the music briefing our Proud Music Library can offer either tracks to license, if they fit. The other possibility is to offer you an individual production and composition after the conditions of the music briefing. An accurate music briefing thus is a big factor of success for the whole audiolevel of the product.

Footage

Uncut film material Filmmaterial that is created by a video or a film production is called footage. This material is nevertheless often exploited on its own by producers through by means of footage archives, where unused film sequences can be licensed.

Television stations usually are interested in News and regional material, film productions need images for advertising spots, TV-Spots and also industrial films are interest in using stock footage.

A simple example: A company needs a tiger to run in the jungle, from left to right on the screen, for an advertising spot. There are prerecorded footage takes available for licensing, which already show  a tiger in the jungle.

Great News – the film production thus saves the costs to fly to India, stay for weeks in the jungle in order to finally get to see a tiger :-). Therefore it is often more advised to investigate, whether there is matching material in the footage archives, available for licensing.

The Proud Music library works according to a similar principle. This time it is no cinematic material but audio footage instead. In our online music database you can research a large number of music footage already produced and available for instant music licensing.

Music Cue Sheet

Cue Sheets are forms submitted to royalty collecting societies with a detailed list of tracks used by a specific audiovisual production. If you have produced a film that is going to be broadcast, you have to fill out a cue sheet and submit it to the royalty collecting society of your country.

The most important list entries on a cue sheet are: track names, playing time of the track, composer and lyricist of the track. If you happen to know a work registration number or the ISWC (International Standard Work Code) or the ISRC (International Standard Record Code) please put in the field, as this helps to avoid mistakes, e.g. due to similar track names or similar composer names.

The royalty collecting society will then use your cue sheet to attribute royalties to the composer of the individual tracks, as most tv broadcast stations have a blanket license with the Royalty Collecting Society of their country. Therefore it is important, to fill out the cue sheet with the information provided by the music licenser. In our case, you’ll get all the information ready for copy&paste in our license document pdf.
Important: The TV stations pay the royalties anyway, this is no additional bill to you, you don’t gain anything by not submitting a cue sheet, only the composer’s won’t be credited their royalties – this is why we kindly ask you to fill out cue sheets.