Music licence for a cafe, gym or salon: what a Commercial track licence covers, and where it stops

A cafe that plays recorded music to its customers usually needs a public-performance licence, and in the UK that licence is TheMusicLicence from PPL PRS. A $9.99 Commercial licence on a single track is a different permission: it clears the cafe's promo reel, not its speakers. Take a cafe owner who buys that licence for "Café com Você", an Afro Sunset Brasil track that runs three minutes and one second. The track goes under a forty-second reel of the morning service, and the reel goes on Instagram. That use is settled. Then the same WAV file is copied to the tablet behind the counter and added to the playlist that runs from seven until closing. Same track, same receipt, same room. It is a different use, and the licence was written for the first one.

Is playing a track in a cafe the same as using it in a video?

No. They are two separate acts under copyright, and they are usually licensed by different parties.

Putting music under pictures is a production use, often called synchronisation. The track is copied into a new work, the reel, and the reel is published. Permission comes from whoever owns the track, and it is granted for that kind of production.

Playing music aloud in a room where customers sit is a public performance. Nothing new is made. The track is heard, by people who are not the owner's family. United States law draws the line in its definitions. In Section 101 of the Copyright Act, to perform a work "publicly" means "to perform or display it at a place open to the public or at any place where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered". A cafe at eight in the morning fits the first half of that sentence.

The UK government's guidance reaches the same place by listing rooms. Its page on music licensing says "You usually need a licence to play live or recorded music in public", and the list that follows includes "hairdressers and beauty salons", "restaurants and cafes" and "gyms and other health facilities". The licence it names is TheMusicLicence, issued by PPL PRS, and what TheMusicLicence covers and costs has its own post. The same page is direct about the alternative: "You're infringing copyright if you play live or recorded music in public without a licence."

A reel copies the track into something new. A speaker in a cafe only plays it, and playing it to the public is a separate right.

What does the Commercial licence cover for a venue?

The Commercial tier at ONE36TY Sounds is described in one line: "Ads, client work, film, games, unlimited views. Non-exclusive." Every item on that list is a production. For a cafe, gym or salon, that reaches most of what a venue publishes:

• the reel or advert that shows the room, at any view count
• a class trailer or a timetable video for a gym
• a before-and-after montage on a salon's page

The promo case has its own post, and a reel that ends up on a monetised channel is covered in the YouTube question.

What the line does not name is the tablet behind the counter. Playing the file through a room's speakers in opening hours is not an ad, a film or a game, and "unlimited views" counts the viewers of a video, not the customers in a queue. It is the studio's own line, and I would rather call it silent on in-venue playback than stretch five nouns to cover it. The site states that "music licences are arranged by email", and the terms of sale say music is used "under the specific licence named on the product page". A venue that wants a track in the room asks first, and the answer arrives in writing.

Does "royalty-free" mean a venue needs no licence at all?

The phrase carries two meanings.

In a music store, royalty-free usually means the buyer pays once and owes the seller nothing per view or per play.

The GOV.UK page appears to use it in a second sense. After the list of venues comes one sentence: "You do not need a licence to play royalty-free music." The page does not define the term. My reading is that it means music no collecting society manages, because a later section says: "If the music you want to play is not managed by PPL PRS, you may need a licence from another licensing body." The test in that sentence is who manages the music, not what the store called it.

A track can be sold for a single fee and still have a composer who belongs to a collecting society, which collects for public performance on the composer's behalf. A receipt answers the first question and leaves the second open until someone checks.

The US text adds a wrinkle. Section 106 lists, for musical works, the right "to perform the copyrighted work publicly". For sound recordings the right is narrower: "to perform the copyrighted work publicly by means of a digital audio transmission". The song and the recording of the song are separate works with separate rights. The UK page points to a similar two-sided structure: a business now needs "a single licence from PPL PRS, instead of separate licences from PRS for Music and PPL."

What does a venue ask its licensing body before the music goes on?

The rules differ by country, and this post describes the mechanics, not a legal position. These are the five questions I would send, the first four to the licensing body where the venue trades and the last to whoever sold the track.

1. Is this track in the body's repertoire? The seller can give the composer's name, which a repertoire search needs.
2. Does the venue licence cover the song, the recording, or both? The answer changes by country, as the US text above shows.
3. What sets the fee? GOV.UK says the cost is based on things like "the venue where you play the music" and "how the music is used". Size matters in the US statute too: Section 110 exempts some radio and television play in an establishment with "less than 2,000 gross square feet of space", a figure that rises to 3,750 for food service and drinking establishments. That exemption concerns broadcasts, not a purchased file.
4. If everything played sits outside the repertoire, what proof is accepted? A playlist and the certificates are the obvious candidates. The body decides.
5. Does the licence permit playing the track in the room, and will the certificate say so? A yes in an email thread is better than a yes remembered.

A venue uses music in two ways, and each has its own gatekeeper. The Commercial licence settles the use that ends up on a screen. The use that fills the room is decided by who manages the composer's rights and by what the seller put in writing. A receipt for $9.99 says nothing about either until someone asks.

Sources

• Licences (Personal, Commercial, Exclusive buyout) · ONE36TY Sounds, one36ty.com/sound
• Terms of sale · ONE36TY
• Get a licence to play live or recorded music · GOV.UK
• Copyright Law of the United States (Title 17), Chapter 1, sections 101, 106 and 110 · U.S. Copyright Office