It’s characters may feel like a bunch of high school misfits, but the quirky musical TV comedy “Glee” is putting smiles on the faces of music industry executives searching for new revenue in an era of plunging album sales.
Two months into the 2009-10 TV season, “Glee” is drawing a weekly audience of 8.6 million viewers to the Fox television network. Fans have bought more than two million tunes sung by the show’s cast on iTunes, and soundtracks are being compiled and sold in traditional stores.
Revenues are being split among Fox and the record company, and artists and music publishers are being paid licensing fees for songs “Glee” uses in musical numbers in each episode.
Record labels are desperate for new types of revenue.
That’s exactly what Sony Music Entertainment’s Columbia Records did last January when the Fox network shopped a pilot of “Glee” to record labels months before it aired.
Columbia won the deal to partner with News Corp’s Fox on the release of all “Glee” music on Apple Corp’s iTunes, as well as on traditional soundtrack albums.
Apparently, industry economics are such that the revenue from TV partnerships “is pretty much a drop in the bucket” in the multi-billion dollar record business.
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