Nature is officially an artist on Spotify
The Sounds Right music initiative will raise conservation funds with songs by David Bowie, Brian Eno and more
"4.6 billion years ago a star was born, but never credited. Today, that changes," the new music initiative SoundsRight posted via Instagram on April 18, announcing itself.
It's a project by the Museum for the United Nations that names Nature as an artist on Spotify, getting credit — and royalties — for any registered song that is indexed as featuring nature sounds. With so many such songs already out in the world, this is a way that artists can officially credit nature and raise money for global conservation efforts.
Each song featuring nature sounds will appear in Spotify's Nature playlists, which currently include tracks by BTS, London Grammar and Ellie Goulding. It also includes the 1995 David Bowie and Brian Eno collaboration "Get Real," which Eno remixed to feature the sounds of wild animals and rainfall.
Nature's Spotify description details that at least 50 per cent of recording royalties from the Sounds Right Feat. Nature playlist, and 70 per cent of recording royalties on the Ecosystem Tracks playlist, are directed to EarthPercent, Eno's environmental charity through which artists can sign over one per cent or more of their songwriting credits to Earth. The charity will then distribute the funds to rights-based conservation initiatives around the world.
According to Forbes, the Sounds Right project "may generate more than $40 million for conservation in the next four years. It also hopes to reach more than 600 million individual listeners in that period." Forbes also noted that "Sounds Right has currently zeroed in on funding organizations that operate in the regions of India, Indo-Burma, Myanmar, Philippines, Atlantic Forest, Tropical Andes, Madagascar, the Indian Ocean Islands and Sundaland."
As of April 30, Nature as an artist already has 2.6 million monthly listeners.