Are Verbal contracts Between Jamaican Artistes and Managers a Recipe for Trouble?

Over the past few years, we have been hearing a lot about ungrateful artiste bamboozling their managers out of both earned money and future earnings. We are lead to believe that this is a new phenomenon but it is not. In fact, this is an old problem, garnering new attention. I would like to point out that this cheating, swindling or whatever you want to label it, ….works both ways: you also find artiste who felt that they have been taken advantage of financially by their managers. The focus here, however, is the so called “ungrateful artiste” that we have been hearing so much about lately.

On March 31st, the Jamaican Gleaner carried a story which highlighted this issue. The story was based on the most recent artiste-manager split- Busy Signal parting ways with his long time manager, Shane Brown.

According Brown, who has studied artiste management in university, the two had no formal written contract, but a verbal agreement, which Brown believed to be legally binding in court.“ I did management studies and part of that is law. My lawyers can tell you how mi stay. I am not a careless person. We had a verbal agreement that is public knowledge. That stands in the court of law.” Brown is right that a verbal contract is legal and binding; however, is it the best route? Especially taking into account we could be talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars and in some cases millions. Ok, grant it that in a lot of cases, and especially in Jamaica, it is common practice for managers and artiste to be informal with one another.

Verbal agreements seem to be the norm in the reggae industry. With the recent surge of artiste and their managers ending on not so great terms, would one not expect the managers to take caution? I would say probably, albeit that has not been the case for most Jamaican artist managers. From a business perspective, when an artist manager enters into a verbal contract with an artist, does s/he not see the potential disaster? Quite frankly, each person should have his or her lawyer go over the contract before signing. This is in the best interest of all. A contract does not have to be complicated; as long as terms and conditions are agreed upon and signed by the parties, it could be written on a dinner napkin, who cares? 

Ashley R. Gordon outlined certain elements that a contract must have in order to be considered legal and enforceable: Basically, a contract is an agreement between two or more parties, especially one that is written and enforceable by law. It must contain the following:

I) Offer. An offer can be oral or written. It is the definite expression or action which begins the contract.
II) Acceptance: the acceptance of the offer made by one party by the other party is what creates the contract. This acceptance, as a general rule, cannot be withdrawn, nor can it vary the terms of the offer, or alter it, or modify it.
III) Consideration. Consideration for a contract may be money or may be another right, interest, or benefit, or it may be a detriment, loss or responsibility given up to someone else. Consideration is an absolutely necessary element of a contract. IV) OBJECT of the Contract. A contract is not enforceable if its object is considered to be illegal
V) Intent of the Parties to Contract. It is a basic requirement to the formation of any contract, be it oral or written. Both parties must have intended to enter into the contract and one can not have been misled by the other.
VI) Capacity of the Parties to Contract. All people have a capacity to contract. He/she must be of sound mind and attain age of majority. 

Jamaican artiste managers are amongst the few countries in the world in which this business is approached with such informal insouciant and nonchalant attitude. Taking into account the recent publicity around this issue, it begs the question, how can this be the case in 2013?

According to lawyer Sucha S. Ollek, There is no requirement that the contract be in writing except in certain special situations such as the sale of land. The problem is that if the verbal exchanges of the parties are to be relied upon, it may prove difficult and in some cases impossible to determine precisely the terms of the contract if there in fact is a contract. If the court can not with reasonable certainty determine the terms that the parties have agreed to, the court can not enforce the alleged contract. It is for this reason that it is wiser to have a contract in writing. So there you have it! Artiste managers, protect thyself and thy client, draft the contract and have it signed before you start creating a star. As a matter of fact, it should be the first step in the artist-manager relationship. 

 

By: Paulet Biedermann

 

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