I had a call this evening from a band I did some work with a year ago. They supplied me with an instrumental track and asked me to come up with lyrics/a melody to lay over it. I did.
They would like to use a repeating section of the melody I came up with (not the lyrics). They said they would include me on their album cover "thank yous" (i.e. not credit me as a co-writer). I said, not knowing much about this sort of thing, that I'd think about it and get back to them.
So, is this sufficient/fair? Part of me thinks yes, great, it'll get listened to and enjoyed - fab. Another part of me thinks that it's a bit daft to be giving away my creativity, as good as anonymously. I don't want to be precious about it - nor a doormat.
Is there a way, legally, of retaining the copyright of this catchy melody section, even if I don't get paid/recognition for its inclusion in their work? I would at least then be free to use it in my writing again without (ironically) having to pay them.
(By the way, they're not a massively well known band, but their last album did reach best-seller status on some charts, so I suppose there's some scope that this forthcoming album will sell OK.)
Thanks for any advice on this.