Music & Ownership SeriesKayatick Styles Most artists think they are signing a deal.They are actually signing away leverage.By the time contracts entered the music business, ownership was already spoken for.Ownership Was Decided Before Artists Entered the RoomWeek 1 established the foundation. Black musicians were professional workers long before the music industry existed. Music was labor. Income ended when the performance ended.Week 2 begins where power quietly shifted.When record labels formalized contracts in the early twentieth century, they were not inventing ownership models. They were legalizing control that already existed through infrastructure.The labels owned the machines.The labels owned the capital.The labels owned...