Royalty-free production music marketplace AudioMicro will begin to give a portion of all proceeds to The Mr. Holland's Opus Foundation, a charitable organization that donates musical instruments to underfunded music programs and supports the growth of music programs in schools nationwide.

The Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation keeps music alive in our schools by donating musical instruments to under-funded music programs, and vital support services to school districts nationwide, giving economically-disadvantaged youth access to the many benefits of music education, leading them to success in school, and inspiring creativity and expression through playing music.

AudioMicro will start by donating 5% of net sales and will continue to look into other ways to get involved with the foundation. The AudioMicro team is comprised of musicians and creators who are always looking for an opportunity to give back and support young future artists.

“We are thrilled to be able to contribute to the future of the industry and creative work that we love, to nurture the next generation of artists and composers at a crucial point in their education,” says Noah Becker, AudioMicro’s president. “We plan to start with this regular contribution and then see what other ways we can help support Mr. Holland’s Opus Foundation and its admirable mission.”

Online video has grown up in the past decade, and royalty-free production music source AudioMicro has grown with it. Founded in 2007 to support the efforts of video creators, the library launched to connect the work of production-oriented composers with the video makers who needed them.

AudioMicro keeps fees low and quality strong, focusing on creators and gathering a wide range of music and sounds representing all genres and approaches. From sound effects to uptempo electronic loops to ambient scores, AudioMicro offers the right music for every image and project, with more than 265,000 tracks--some from GRAMMY-winning composers.

AudioMicro’s President Noah Becker came to the business from the creative side. A seasoned composer and producer as well as music business insider, formerly at Brooklyn Music Ltd, Sony Music Entertainment, and Ultra Records, Becker wanted to create a space where music creators could easily license their works directly to video creators. “We wanted a user-generated content library where people could find awesome music and sounds for their videos at an affordable price point,” say Becker.

Since then, the video ecosystem has grown by leaps and bounds, and everyone from YouTubers to OTT video music supervisors need the right soundtrack. To empower them, AudioMicro has focused on constantly refining search, to deliver the right potential tracks efficiently. “We're constantly working on our search and discovery algorithms and methodology,” Becker explains. “Our player is custom and proprietary. It allows you to scroll through search results, and jump to different pages of the results, while simple forward and back arrow cues allow you to move through the songs in your search results. It makes for a more seamless search and discovery process.”

The tech features are coupled with human curation, thanks to the ears of Joshua Priest. A veteran of NBCUniversal and Syfy projects, Priest homes in on the best tracks to feature based on overall general user preferences and sales. “We find uplifting, happy music to be among our popular tracks,” Becker notes, “followed closely by high-energy genres like Dubstep and epic and cinematic pieces, especially tracks designed for trailers."

These tracks and sounds can be licensed for a small, one-time fee, or via a reasonably priced subscription plan, some of the best prices in the industry. Licensing and check out are swift and painless. A select catalog of music and sound effects are available for free.

In all its tech and content management approaches, AudioMicro and its sister company AdRev, which works to claim and monetize audio on platforms like YouTube, keep artists and creators at the center of what they do. “We are all creatives ourselves, and that constantly inspires the way we seek to help others in music and creative industries,” Becker reflects. “We’ve built a company culture around care and empathy, and that’s created incredible employee loyalty, a 96% retention rate over our last ten years. That speaks a lot to our vibe, and that vibe is mirrored in our platforms and products, the way we treat our users.”

Good things happen when two leading lights in their respective spheres synch up. AdRev is now administering and monetizing the entire library of APM Music through YouTube Content ID.

APM Music is one of the largest production music companies in the world, representing approximately 600,000 tracks and 50 unique libraries. Its music catalog runs the gamut from artist-driven indie tracks and authentic archival treasures to adrenalin-pumping stadium anthems and compelling trailer cues. Some of APM’s notable tracks and accomplishments include the “The Monday Night Football Theme” and “People’s Court”, as well as extensive placements in popular, award-winning film, TV, and video game projects such as Game of Thrones, This is Us, Westworld, Stranger Things, The Shape of Water, and Call of Duty.

AdRev is one of the most trusted and skilled partners for production music and other catalog rights holders. Part of the PMA (Production Music Association), the LA-based company specializes in optimizing monetization for production music libraries, digging deep into opportunities by employing human savvy and tech know-how. “We are thrilled to offer our services and expertise to APM, a major player in the production music world and a valuable PMA member,” says AdRev President Noah Becker.

"We are excited about working with AdRev's high quality team for our YouTube Content ID administration and monetization,” says APM President Adam Taylor. “They have years of experience and expertise in monetizing production music in YouTube. We know our music is in good hands, and we look forward to a successful partnership."

These kinds of partnerships have led to more than $100 million in payouts to rights holders since its inception, thanks to AdRev’s commitment to maximizing monetization across all possible platforms, and thanks to the stellar quality of partners’ music and catalogs.

"We're thrilled to partner with Rob Cairns, Adam and his fantastic team at APM. Adam is an incredibly sharp, forward thinking business leader and strategist. This is the kind of partnership that will catalyze bold new ideas, technology, and services offerings that will benefit our entire client base,” says Becker. “We're super fired up!"

“Music rights holders handing over YouTube claiming rights to their distributors hoping for the best, generally are missing a large part of their online video income,” says AdRev President Noah Becker. He should know. AdRev has paid out over $100 million to their roster of publishers and TV/film production libraries since it was founded in 2011. The company represents music rights found in over 320 million videos on YouTube.

“We recognize YouTube’s innate ability to drive revenue, audience, analytics and marketing. Understanding this, we have built a team of 30 dedicated staff members, that live and breathe all things YouTube. The team all have a firm, foundational understanding of music rights and intricacies. Couple that team with a variety of in-house proprietary tech and joint ventures with other leading technologists in the space, and we’re consistently able to drive revenue upwards of 100% within the first 6 months for newly onboarded clients” explains Becker.

Becker continues, “It requires a combination of technical knowledge on the nuances of YouTube’s robust Content ID system - a layer of incredible technology to help rights owners and admins with optics on music uses and video analytics - and diligent humans with musical knowledge. I caution anyone receiving a pitch from any rights administrator about their fully automated system. Automation is great, but it can’t pick up a phone and work out a pending copyright dispute with another administrator, or identify a cover version of a song that is off tempo from the original and in a different scale, or you know...woefully out of key.”

By starting in the production music library side of the business, AdRev are experts in demystifying and actioning on complex rights uses. “We got our start working with a great deal of the production music libraries in the States and beyond, giving us the advantage of getting to cut our teeth on all facets of YouTube’s Content ID system – sound recordings, publishing assets, and music videos / A/V assets. Understanding the various asset types and how they monetize and interact inside YouTube’s system helps us keep clients’ rights fully optimized on the platform.”

“We are proud to partner with AdRev in the worldwide claiming rights of our music assets,” says Henry Alonzo, CEO of Adarga Entertainment Group. “Their infrastructure and expertise of the industry has helped us correctly protect and monetize copyrighted content for the artists that we manage. We've seen exponential growth in our YouTube income since migrating to their platform.”

While others are waiting to monetize user generated videos posted on other social media networks, AdRev has already seen a leap by monitoring things like Instagram videos getting re-posted to YouTube. “We’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg,” says AdRev’s VP of Content Strategy Matt Whitmire, “Content from other platforms is often re-posted in almost near real time to YouTube – getting those unlicensed re-posts claimed expeditiously is one of the key factors in driving revenue and adding value for our clients.”

While Facebook is starting to roll out deals with the Majors, AdRev execs are looking forward to helping Facebook administer rights management and royalty payouts for their extensive roster of clients. “We know from our experience with YouTube that it’s critical for these large-scale platforms to stay focused on what they do best, inspiring vast amounts of user-generated content to support their advertising businesses, and creating new revenue streams for creators,” Becker reflects. “We’re excited to see this grow as we continue to help solve the challenges of rights management in the UGC era.”


About AdRev

AdRev (adrev.net) is a global leader for YouTube monetization and administration of audiovisual and music copyrights, proprietary unclaimed search, and royalty accounting software for the music and entertainment industry. AdRev currently administers over 10+ million copyrights and monetizes over 250+ million videos. The entire AdRev ops team is YouTube Certified and available around the clock to serve the company’s partners. It offers several tiers of scaled service to fit a variety of needs from monetization and copyright administration to full channel build out.

AdRev, an industry leading rights administration service and platform, has hired Nick LaPointe, a music industry veteran with a decades-long career in publishing, specifically in mechanical rights and licensing. He comes to AdRev from Warner/Chappell, joining the company’s Los Angeles-based team.

"Nick LaPointe has an extensive history of advocating for artists, labels, and publishers through 20 years of experience in the music industry,” says Noah Becker, AdRev President and co-founder. “I’ve known Nick since we worked together during my tenure overseeing mechanicals at SME in the mid 2000s. His passion for protecting the rights of the creative class, connections to music insiders, and unsurpassed knowledge of music business make him an ideal fit for AdRev.”

A graduate of Berklee in music business and management, LaPointe held a number of copyright and mechanical licensing roles at Warner/Chappell.  ”I am thrilled to be joining AdRev’s team of digital rights specialists,” LaPointe states. “I’m looking forward to bringing my music industry knowledge of managing writers rights to the company, while helping AdRev continue to expand their already robust service and technology offerings.”

In a landscape of multiplying uses and complex rights pictures, AdRev is expanding its already substantial expertise with leadership from professionals like LaPointe. And as video, and thus music in video, becomes ubiquitous, LaPointe’s knowledge will prove invaluable in expanding income and rights protection opportunities for AdRev’s clients.

About AdRev

AdRev is a global leader for YouTube monetization and administration of audiovisual and music copyrights, proprietary unclaimed search, and royalty accounting software for the music and entertainment industry. AdRev currently administers over 10+ million copyrights and monetizes over 250+ million videos.

The entire AdRev ops team is YouTube Certified and available around the clock to serve the company’s partners. It offers several tiers of scaled service to fit a variety of needs from monetization and copyright administration to full channel build out.