9,000 musicians missing royalty payments

WASHINGTON, Sept. 29 (UPI) -- The Washington-based group responsible for distributing royalty checks to artists says 9,000 musicians have yet to claim their share of payments.

The Los Angeles Times said the recording industry organization, SoundExchange, has released a list of thousands of musical artists who have yet to claim royalties due to them, all in an attempt to distribute nearly $500,000 in royalty checks.

The unpaid funds to artists such as the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and rapper Mos Def will be forfeited if not collected by Dec. 15, and the group's inability so far to complete such transactions has organization execs worried for SoundExchange's future.

SoundExchange exec John L. Simson, whose organization is currently lobbying the Library of Congress to maintain its place in the music industry, claimed the inability to deliver the Internet and satellite radio royalties was due to the related artists' inaction.

"Look, there may be people that you can Google and find," Simson told The Times. "If they're well-known people, we've probably found them too. We've probably mailed multiple things to them without any response. What it shows you is perhaps for major artists or their management ... this may have been lower on the priority list than the current tour or the current recording."