Canada's SOCAN buys CMRRA to unify music rights licensing

Canadian songwriter collecting society SOCAN has acquired CMRRA, the country's mechanical rights organisation, which has been owned by US collecting society SoundExchange since 2017, Complete Music Update reported. Still subject to regulatory approval, the deal would consolidate nearly all Canadian song-rights licensing, the performing side and the mechanical side alike, inside a single organisation instead of two separate ones.

The distinction matters because the music industry has traditionally handled these two rights separately. Performing rights are exploited when music is performed, broadcast or made available online, and songwriters typically assign those to a society like SOCAN, which collects from broadcasters and venues and pays songwriters and publishers their share. Mechanical rights, exploited when music is copied onto discs or into streaming platforms, usually get licensed directly by publishers or through a separate mechanical rights society. That split is why markets like the UK still run PRS and MCPS as distinct bodies working closely together.

CMRRA's ownership history reflects how tangled that split can get. It was an independent licensing collective before SoundExchange, the US collecting society best known for administering satellite and online broadcast royalties for labels and performers, bought it in 2017. SOCAN, meanwhile, already bought Canada's other mechanical rights body, SODRAC, back in 2018, meaning it has handled mechanical licensing for some repertoire for eight years even before this deal.

SOCAN CEO Jennifer Brown said the acquisition will "strengthen Canada's music rights landscape," making licensing easier for music publishers and creators, while CMRRA President Paul Shaver called it a chance to "drive innovation" and deepen service to publishers and self-published songwriters. Both framed the deal as recognition that digital platforms now exploit performing and mechanical rights simultaneously, unlike the pre-digital era when record labels and broadcasters were more clearly separate customers for each.

An official announcement described the combination as bringing together "SOCAN's century-long leadership in performing rights administration" with "CMRRA's more than 50 years of specialised expertise in reproduction rights." If regulators approve it, Canada will join a small group of markets where a single body issues licenses covering both sides of a song's copyright.