The Big Four Record Labels

1. The Big Four Charlotte Vincent

2. Emi Emi (Electric and musical industries) is a British multinational music company, who have headquarters within L ondon and are the fourth largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, and is one of the ‘big four’ record companies. From the late 1950’s to the early 1970’s managed to enjoy success in the popular music field when they were under management of Sir Joseph Lockwood. With the strong combination of Emi, and its subsidiary labels which include Parlophone , Hmv , Columbia and Capitol Records along with groups such as The Beatles, and single artists such as Cliff Richard and Frank Sinatra helped to make EMI the best known and most successful recording company in the world at that time. In 1971, Electric And Musical Industries changed their name to EMI Ltd. Then in 1973, Gramophone company then became EMI records Ltd as well. Thorn Electircal industries merged into Emi which then formed Thorn EMI. Thorn Emi then bought 50% interest from Chrysalis records which helped to complete the buyout two years later, after six months of this Thorn Emi then bought Virgin Records from Richard Branson.

3. Warner Music Warner Music Group is the third largest business group and family of record labels in the recording industry, making it one of the big four. It is unable to trace its ancestry unlike the other four big record companies. In 1963, Warner Bros records purchased Reprise Records, which three years earlier, was founded by Frank Sinatra, was so he could have more control over the creativity of his recordings. After Warner was sold to Seven Arts Productions in 1967, it purchased Atlantic Records, founded in 1947 and Warner Music Group’s oldest label. Two years after being purchased by Seven Arts, the Warner Bros- Seven Arts company was sold to the Kinney National Company. During the 1970’s, the Warner group built up a commanding position in the music industry. In 170, it bought Elektra for $10 million, bringing in leading rock acts including The Doors, Tim Buckley etc. Around the 1980’s Warner’s name was changed to Time Warner, and throughout the 1990’s was the largest media company in the world, where their assets where in excess of $20 billion.

4. Universal Music Group Universal Music group is a multinational music company, being the largest of the big four. Reasons for this include, its leading market share and its multitude of global operations. UMG helped to co-developed Vevo, the site in which has been designed for music videos, and tend to be in a higher quality then the ones that are streamed from you tube. Universal music was once known as the music company that was attached to the film studio Universal Pictures. The UMG main global headquarters are located in Santa Monica.

5. Sony Bmg Sony BMG, was a recorded music company, and began as a result of the 50-50 joint venture between Sony Music and Bertelsmann music. It is one of the big four and includes ownership and distrubtion of recording labels such as Arista Records, Columbia Records, Epic Records etc. In October 2007, it was announced that Sony BMG successfully sued Jammie Thomas, the single mother who managed to make $36,000 a year, was then ordered to pay $222,220 in damages for making 24 songs available for download.

6. This graph shows the differences between the big four, and then other less well known record labels. This helps us to establish how well they are doing in things such as market shares, who their owners are, or may be, and people that they may be signing up.

7. The Big four. The big four, are known for representing the majority of music sold nowadays, and altogether made 75% within the music market, or could be more, depending on what sort of a year it had been for them with music sales, etc. Artists that get signed up to one of the big for, will either get signed up to big company itself, or one that the company may have purchased. These are known as subsidiary companies, and they can tend to make sign up their own artists so they can ensure that their finances are ok. If any of the Big Four have any subsidiary companies, they are responsible for their overall budget and the staff that can tend to be hired within them. In 2005, Universal accounted for 25.5% of the market, with key artists being, Black Eyed Peas, Kanye West etc. Sony accounted for 21.5% of the market, with key artists including- Kelly Clarkson, Britney Spears etc. Emi accounted for 13.4% of the market, with key artists being, Coldplay and Robbie Williams, etc. And finally, Warner accounted for 11.3% of the market, with their main artists being- My Chemical Romance, Green Day, Madonna, etc. They were known as the Big Four from 2009.