LOS ANGELES, March 24, 2020 (Newswire.com) –Â As music artists are canceling tours in the midst of the worldwide COVID-19 outbreak, Los Angeles-based record label Fyrehouse is donating all of its streaming proceeds to its artists.
“It’s the right thing to do,” said Miguel V. Solano, founder and chief executive officer of Fyrehouse. “In this time of uncertainty, we want Fyrehouse artists to be confident that they can generate income, even when the normal routes of doing so are unavailable.”
Music artists earn the majority of their income by touring, but tours are being postponed and canceled in the face of the coronavirus and efforts to limit the spread of COVID-19. That leaves many artists unsure of their income or when their tours will resume.
Together, record labels earn billions of dollars each year from streaming, and they usually take a majority split, Solano said. According to Rolling Stone magazine, three of the largest record labels — Sony, Universal, and Warner — earned a combined $6.93 billion from streaming services in 2018. Music artists earned only 12% of the $43 billion in sales as a result of their U.S. work, which includes streaming music, CD sales, concert tickets, and more, Digital Music News reported in 2018.
Solano expects streaming numbers and revenue to grow during the COVID-19 pandemic as more and more people stay in their homes as the coronavirus spreads.
“As the coronavirus threatens the livelihood of a growing number of musicians, it is not enough to simply tell our artists how much we appreciate their work and how their music is helping us all to cope in this unpredictable time,” Solano said. “Fyrehouse is proud to support our artists in this unprecedented way, and I hope other labels follow suit.”