By Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson in New York
US rights to six of The Beatles? earliest songs are changing hands for the first time in almost 50 years, after a small music publisher beat larger global groups to a portfolio of copyrights including ?She Loves You?, ?I Saw Her Standing There? and ?From Me To You?.
Round Hill Music, a year-old US start-up that bought the catalogue with Adage Classics, an intellectual property rights group, declined to disclose the terms.
Michael Sukin, a music lawyer, said the songs could be worth up to $10m, or 50,000 times what they were once offered for in 1964. Another industry member who would not be named put their value at $15m-$20m, or 20 times the annual income he estimated they generate.
George Pincus, a New York song promoter with a UK offshoot, acquired US and Canadian rights to the John Lennon and Paul McCartney compositions after seeing The Beatles perform in 1963. Dick James, their UK publisher, had no luck interesting larger US publishers.
What Mr Pincus paid was not disclosed, but in 1964 he offered the song rights for sale at $200. His sons, Leonard and Irwin, resisted approaches from groups including Sony/ATV, the joint venture between Sony and Michael Jackson, which holds rights to 251 Lennon and McCartney songs. Sony ATV has an interest in the six songs, and keeps a percentage of the income they generate.
?It wasn?t simply a commercial transaction,? said Herb Jordan, chief executive of Adage Classics. ?We had to convince them we?d bring a level of respect, expertise and creativity.?
The brothers? decision to sell was described as ?a dream come true? by Richard Rowe, the Round Hill Music partner and former president of Sony/ATV whose father turned down The Beatles in 1962.
Dick Rowe was head of A&R for Decca Records when The Beatles came to audition. A colleague picked a local London band instead and Mr Rowe broke the news with the prediction that guitar bands were ?on their way out?. He later signed the Rolling Stones.
The transaction follows two deals that will break up EMI, The Beatles? record company. Universal Music has applied for regulatory approval to acquire EMI?s recorded music business for $1.9bn, and a Sony consortium is looking to acquire EMI Music Publishing for $2.2bn.
Neil Gillis, president of Round Hill Music, said such mergers could benefit smaller rivals. ?As the majors continue to consolidate, they have fewer and fewer staff to manage more and more songs,? he said. Mr Gillis said Round Hill could offer a higher level of service, pitching songs more actively for use in advertisements, films or recordings by a new generation of performers.
? The Financial Times Limited 2012