Taylor Swift’s Master Recordings Were Sold, And She’s Not Happy About it
Earlier today, Variety reported that Scooter Braun’s Ithaca Holdings, which acquired Big Machine Label Group 17 months ago, sold the master recordings of Taylor Swift’s albums to another investor.
In a message to fans on Twitter, Swift verified the report. “A few weeks ago my team received a letter from a private equity company called Shamrock Holdings, letting us know that they had bought 100% of my music, videos and album art from Scooter Braun… The letter told me that they wanted to reach out before the sale to let me know, but that Scooter Braun had required that they made no contact with me or my team, or the deal would be off. As soon as we started communication with Shamrock, I learned that under their terms Scooter Braun will continue to profit off my old musical catalog for many years. I was hopeful and open to the possibility of a partnership with Shamrock, but Scooter’s participation is a non-starter for me.”
The master recordings that Swift references are the original recordings of her first six albums. But, she says, she’s going to re-record all of those albums so that her fans will have the option to listen to her music without Braun profiting off of it.
Read her entire message below; she also included her letter to Shamrock in the tweet.
/photo/1Been getting a lot of questions about the recent sale of my old masters. I hope this clears things up. pic.twitter.com/sscKXp2ibD
— Taylor Swift (@taylorswift13) November 16, 2020
