ASCAP history

In December 1920, the Society rearranged its compensation and representation structures to reflect the growing importance of popular music publishers.

However, these victories were so expensive they prompted ASCAP to consider doubling its rates in order to cover legal expenses, which amounted to more than $40,000 in 1921--22.

ASCAP billed about $380,000 in 1922; two-thirds came from movie theaters.

ASCAP was working to license sound motion pictures by the time The Jazz Singer proved the commercial viability of the medium in 1927.

In 1931 ASCAP received fees of $960,000 from the radio industry.

The Justice Department sued ASCAP in 1937 but abandoned the case.

Cowell recorded Olmeda’s rendition of six Italian folksongs, including “Marinaro (The Sailor),” and “La Capinera (The Blackbird),” a song that he said he had learned from his father. Italian-American Mario Olmeda shared his passion for traditional Italian singing with folk music collector Sidney Robertson Cowell on February 13, 1939, in Concord, California.

In 1940 ASCAP collected $7.3 million, $4 million from radio.

Instead, the stations played regional music and styles (like rhythm and blues or country) that had been rejected by ASCAP. Upon the conclusion of litigation between broadcasters and ASCAP in October 1941, ASCAP was legally required to settle for a lower fee than they had initially demanded.

So ASCAP spearheaded a congressional investigation into the practice of payola in 1959.

In 1981, ASCAP prevailed against CBS in an eleven-year-old court case challenging the ASCAP blanket license.

ASCAP collected $390 million in 1992.

In 1996 ASCAP proposed dramatically lower per-program rates for news, talk, and religious television stations.

In 1998 ASCAP distributed nearly $425 million of its $508 million gross to writers; both were records.

In 2005, ASCAP collected US$750 million in licensing fees and distributed US$646 million in royalties to its members, with a 12.5% operating expense ratio.