Guides

Music publishing in Germany

How music publishing actually works in Germany: who claims which rights, what the national copyright system does, and what it takes for a publisher to set up and collect.

Who claims which rights

Performance and mechanical: GEMA. Sync: direct.

Copyright registration in Germany

Automatic under Berne; no registry.

Setting up to claim publishing rights

GEMA accepts foreign publishers (admission ~€180 plus ~€100/year) with no nationality restriction; registrations flow through ICE. German administration is famously exacting about publisher documentation — chains of title and writer contracts should be in order before joining. Sub-publishing remains the norm for catalogs without German-speaking administration.

The societies

GEMA · ICE — each linked page covers the society’s history and how registrations reach it.

Rules, fees, and society requirements change, and none of this is legal advice — confirm current requirements with the society or local counsel before committing. Registrations bound for Germany can be checked free on the validator · more: setting up country by country · which societies accept CWR.

Deutsche Version

Two free checks for your CWR file. Is the file correct? Every record, share and control total against the spec, each problem on its exact line. Do its writers match their registrations? Every writer cross-checked against public registration data, including works registered under another spelling or IPI. Nothing stored: check a file at cwrcheck.com.