Rosanne Cash Writes an Open Letter on Streaming and Fair Compensation for Musicians and Songwriters

Bruce Houghton wrote a painfully sexist Hypebot article pointing to Rosanne Cash's recent Facebook postings on artist and songwriter compensation from music streaming services, where Ms. Cash called streaming "dressed up piracy" because of the low compensation rates. Aside from calling her a "little girl," Houghton also misspelled the first name of the Grammy winner with eleven (11) Billboard #1 Singles. Ms. Cash took the high road this morning when she posted this thoughtful reply on her Facebook page.

I’m not worried about me. I’m worried about the entire next generation of songwriters and musicians who are dispirited and feel completely devalued and who give up their dreams in order to earn a decent paycheck. For every Mick Jagger, there are 10,000 in the trenches who feel they are no longer valued members of society because people who will pay ten bucks for a cappuccino and a muffin will not pay the same amount to buy an album of original music that an artist may have put years of heart and sweat into making. 

The rest of her reply is well worth your time, so please spend the two or three minutes of your time that she's earned and check out the latest missive from Zone C.

Her new album, The River & The Thread, is a moving meditation on The South, roots, music, and what's due.

Check out "A Feather's Not a Bird"live for KCRW with John Leventhal.

then buy tickets to see them play at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts in Skokie on October 25th.