In some cases, the artist will allow you to use their music, but demand "royalty payments". These royalties are an ongoing obligation that you must pay for as long as you continue to use their music.

Now if you're planning on creating your own guided meditation (or similar) audio production and using music in the background, or if you operate a healing center and want to play music publically to your clients, then the last thing you want to be burdened with is ongoing royalty payments.

That's where "royalty free" music comes in.

In a nutshell, "Royalty Free" means that you only pay a one-time fee for the music you purchase. You can use that music for commercial purposes without having to pay any royalties/commissions to the artist ever again. For example, you could use the music in the background of your own guided meditation recording and then sell CD's of your recording, and you won't have to pay any other fees to the artist.

Royalty free music licenses vary from one organization to the next, so you should always read the license terms carefully to make sure that you will not breach any copyright laws.

For example, some royalty free music licenses will limit you to a maximum of 2,000 or 5,000 CD productions before your license expires.

It's also worth mentioning that royalty free music licenses usually do not allow you to take the music and resell it, unmodified, to other people. In other words, you can use the music in the background of a video production, or in the background of a spoken word performance, but you can't just resell the music in its original form.

Relaxing royalty free background music - unlimited license terms

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Article by Christopher Lloyd Clarke from www.The-Guided-Meditation-Site.com.