31 creator organizations demand consent and fair pay before labels sign AI deals

31 organizations representing artists, songwriters, and their managers signed an open letter on June 22, 2026, telling record labels and music publishers to stop signing AI deals over creators’ heads. The letter asks for three commitments as the deals pile up: real consent, fair pay, and transparency about the terms.

The European Music Managers Alliance coordinated the letter. Signatories include the Featured Artists Coalition, the Ivors Academy, and the Music Managers Forum in the UK.

What the open letter asks labels to commit to

The letter starts with a plain observation. Labels and publishers, the majors most of all, are now “negotiating AI deals that could shape the future of music.” That includes the deals already announced with Suno, Udio, KLAY, and Spotify.

And yet, it argues, “the artists and songwriters whose works, voices, performances, likenesses and creative identities make those deals valuable are not being meaningfully consulted.”

So the asks are specific:

• Consent that means something, not a box ticked on the artist’s behalf.
• Fair compensation for the work that trains and powers these models.
• Transparency about what the deals actually contain.

EMMA Executive Director Jess Partridge framed the timing directly.

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Amidst a flurry of AI deals, EMMA has coordinated this letter because of mounting concerns about the misappropriation and landgrab of artist and songwriter rights.

Why artists say default opt-ins aren’t consent

The letter concedes that some artists and songwriters are getting emails from labels and publishers that have entered AI deals. The problem is what those emails say. Too often they are just “informing them that they will be opted in to AI-related uses by default, with little actual choice offered.”

That is the gap. An opt-out notice sent after a deal is signed is not the same as asking first. The letter’s point is that artists and songwriters “remain the primary holders” of the rights being licensed, so they should be at the table before the terms are set, not informed once they are locked.

This is the second creator-side move in a month. It follows the AFM lawsuit against Universal and Warner, and it lands the same week as a report showing nearly 300 AI deals already signed across the industry.

What it means for independent artists and songwriters

If you record or write under a label or publisher that has signed one of these deals, read your inbox carefully. The default opt-in the letter describes is how your catalog ends up training a model without you ever saying yes.

The bigger signal is who shapes the standard. The major deals, from the label equity stakes in Suno and Udio to the NMPA template with Udio and KLAY to the Spotify remix product, set the terms everyone else inherits. A coordinated letter from 31 groups is the creator class trying to write itself back into that negotiation.