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Pitching13 min read

How to send music to music supervisors (and spot fake ones)

How to send music to music supervisors: who to pitch, a short email template, links not attachments, one polite follow-up and the red flags of fake ones.

By Daniel Angelucci, composer and founder of DADAAUDIO

To send music to a music supervisor, pick someone whose shows, films or ads genuinely fit your sound, write a short email (three or four lines) that says why the track fits and what is cleared, and include one link that streams and downloads, never an attachment (an Aerie share link does both, and shows you who listened). Make sure every file carries its title, writers, owners and your contact details. Then follow up once, about two weeks later, and leave it there. And if a "supervisor" asks you for money to get placed, walk away.

That is the whole method. The rest of this article is the detail: how to research, what to write, what the supervisor sees when they click, when to chase, and how to tell a real request from a scam.

Who to pitch: research first

Every guide written by people who work in sync starts in the same place. Sync Summit's Mark Frieser calls research the greatest tool you have, and Symphonic's guide puts it first in its list: pitch supervisors whose projects actually fit your sound.

In practice:

  • Start from the work, not from a list of names. Pick shows, films, games or campaigns you know and like. Use Tunefind to see what music was used in specific episodes and films, and IMDb to find who supervised them.
  • Look at what they place. Does the show use major-label hits, indie artists, or library music? If every song is a hit by a famous act, an unknown track is a long shot. If you see lots of independent artists, the door is more open.
  • Find something specific to say. A line like "you used X in episode 4, and my track sits in the same world" shows you did the work. Ten minutes of reading interviews or watching a panel is usually enough.
  • Know whether there is a brief. Supervisors mostly send private briefs to publishers, labels and libraries they trust, because those people can clear music fast. That is how music supervisor Ryan Svendsen describes it. An open brief is an invitation with rules: answer exactly what it asks. A cold email has no invitation, so it has to be even shorter and more relevant.

Sync reps, publishers and libraries exist because most supervisors work through relationships. Pitching yourself is still possible, but it works best when you are precise.

From my own experience

The best way to meet a supervisor, by far, is in person. Cold email turns into a numbers game; showing up at the right events and actually talking to people can start a relationship, and that holds for every kind of creative work and every collaboration. Many clients and supervisors I first met online I can now call not just collaborators but friends, and that's a stroke of luck. The surest way is to get yourself heard: put your shoes on and go to music business events, conferences and film festivals.

The email: short, specific, cleared

Sync Summit's rule is no more than three short paragraphs, and for an unsolicited email, no more than 3–4 lines in total. Supervisors get hundreds of emails a day. Yours needs to answer four questions quickly: who are you, why this track for this project, where can I hear it, and can I clear it fast?

Subject line. Make it useful in a crowded inbox: the track, the fit and the main fact. For example: "Night Drive" – moody synth instrumental for [show], one-stop. If you are answering a brief, use the brief's name or reference. Don't write "Listen to my music" and never put "Follow up" in the subject (more on that below).

The body. One line on who you are. One line on why this track fits this project. The link. One line on what is cleared and what else you have.

What's cleared. This is the line most pitches leave out, and the one supervisors care about. Svendsen says the best pitches he received told him whether the music was one-stop (one person or company controls both the master and the publishing, so a single licence covers it). Say it only if it is true. Then list what you can deliver: instrumental, clean version, cutdowns (30 s, 60 s), stems, WAVs on request. Symphonic recommends having those alts ready even if you don't send them all at first.

Avoid "perfect". Svendsen's advice: never call your track perfect for the project. You haven't seen the scene. Say how it fits the brief instead.

A ready email template

Subject: "[Track title]" – [mood/genre] [vocal or instrumental] for [show / film / brief name], one-stop

Hi [first name],

I'm [name], a [composer / songwriter / producer] working in [genre]. I noticed you used [song or kind of music] in [project], and I think "[track title]" could sit in the same world: [one concrete detail – tempo, mood, the moment it builds at 1:10].

Stream and download here: [link]

Master and publishing are both mine, so it's one-stop. Instrumental, clean version, 30 s and 60 s cutdowns and stems are ready if useful.

Thanks for listening, [Name] · [email] · [phone] · [website]

That is under 100 words. If you are answering a brief, swap the second sentence for the brief's requirements and how the track meets them (genre, budget if one was given, vocal or instrumental, any timestamp worth jumping to).

Send it from an address on your own domain if you can. Svendsen says he skipped submissions from personal Yahoo or Gmail accounts during his open brief, because a professional address suggests you know how to clear and negotiate.

How many tracks?

There is no single number, and the sources disagree for a reason: it depends on whether you were asked.

Situation How many Why
Cold email One or two, at most three Symphonic: one or two strong songs usually beat a giant playlist
Answering a brief What the brief asks; if it doesn't say, a short focused playlist Svendsen found about 10 songs per brief a sweet spot, enough to show a relevant catalogue
They asked for more Whatever they asked for, quickly Speed matters: Sync Summit says to reply within the hour during working hours

Whatever the number, every track must fit. Sending reggae to someone looking for jazz, as Frieser puts it, is the classic pet peeve.

This is the one rule everyone agrees on. Attachments clog inboxes, can land in spam, and can't be passed around easily. Music supervisor Thomas Golubic has said that attaching MP3s is a good way to make enemies of supervisors.

Send one link that does three things:

  1. Streams without a login or an app to install.
  2. Downloads, because the supervisor will pass the track to the editor or director to try against picture. Symphonic suggests a 320 kbps MP3 for the first pitch and WAVs when they ask; Sync Summit says to have at least a 16-bit, 44.1 kHz WAV ready.
  3. Shows who you are: track title, artist and contact on the page, not "audio01.mp3".

What the supervisor sees when they open it

Click your own link in a private browser window before you send it, as if you were the supervisor. Ask yourself:

  • Does it open straight to the music, or to a sign-up wall?
  • Can I tell in five seconds which track is which, and who wrote it?
  • Can I download without hunting for a button?
  • Is there a way to reach you or ask about a licence from the page itself?
  • If I forward this link to an editor, will it still make sense to them?

If your strongest moment is at 1:10, say so in the email. Svendsen listened to the first few seconds of each submission to judge fit, so a timestamp can save a track from being skipped.

Metadata inside the files

Links get forwarded and files get downloaded, and once your MP3 sits in someone's folder, the file is all that's left. Svendsen puts metadata at the top of his priorities and said a track missing titles, tags or contact details was disqualified. Pam Lewis-Rudden's guest post for Synchtank is blunter: "Metadata or Die".

Embed at least this in every file (MP3 ID3 tags, or the fields in your pitching tool):

  • Track title and artist
  • Writers and publisher (with the society, such as PRS, ASCAP, BMI, SACEM, GEMA, SIAE or SOCAN)
  • Master owner / label
  • Licensing contact: name, email, phone
  • ISRC, if the recording has one
  • Genre, mood, tempo (BPM), vocal or instrumental, explicit or clean
  • Lyrics, for vocal tracks

Name the file the same way: Artist - Track Title (Instrumental).mp3. And before any of it, know who owns what: every writer's split, the master owner, and whether there are samples. Sync Summit is clear that if you can't show you own or control it, you shouldn't pitch it.

The follow-up: once, then let go

The advice from people who work in sync is consistent:

  • Wait about two weeks. Frieser suggests one follow-up email after two weeks of silence, and then nothing more. Symphonic says one polite follow-up after a reasonable time is fine, multiple follow-ups every few days are not.
  • Don't ask "did you listen?" Lewis-Rudden calls it one of the most asked and most infuriating questions supervisors get, and points out that if they want your music, they will get in touch.
  • Don't put "Follow up" in the subject line. Reply in the same thread instead, so your original link and context are right there.
  • Add something, or say nothing. A good follow-up gives them a reason to look: a new alt, a cutdown, a stem pack, or a short note that the track is still available and one-stop.

Silence is not rejection. The project may be locked, the scene may be gone, or the timing may be wrong. Keep the relationship clean and pitch the next relevant thing in a few months.

I remember a client who seemed to have vanished for months. It was a big one, and they'd sounded interested after our call, so I assumed I'd done something wrong. Months and months later they came back: that project had fallen through, but they had another one where my sound was exactly what they needed. It's proof that if you make yourself heard, people remember you. And if people remember you, it's only a matter of time before the lead arrives.

What not to do

  • Don't attach files. Ever, unless asked.
  • Don't cold-call. Music Gateway's guide calls unexpected calls a red flag for busy supervisors.
  • Don't send unsolicited video edits of their show with your music swapped in. Frieser explains that supervisors work hard to get music approved and don't welcome someone re-cutting their project without permission.
  • Don't pitch music you can't clear: uncleared samples, a co-writer who hasn't agreed, a label you forgot about.
  • Don't say you do every genre. Specialise, and send what you're best at.
  • Don't send on a Friday if you can help it. Svendsen received about 90% of his weekly submissions on Fridays; midweek, people are more likely to have time.

Bought and scraped contact lists

You will see "500 music supervisor emails" for sale, or tools that scrape addresses from IMDb and LinkedIn. Mass-mailing a list like that is the opposite of everything above: no research, no fit, no reason to read. It also damages your sender reputation, so your future emails land in spam.

There's a legal side too, and it varies by country. In the UK, the ICO's rules on marketing emails treat sole traders as individuals, who need to have consented, and the ICO says the "soft opt-in" never covers bought-in lists. Many supervisors are freelancers. A single, researched, personal email to someone whose work you know is a very different thing from a blast to a scraped list. If in doubt, find people through their published work, their company or an open brief, and always make it easy for them to say "no thanks".

How to spot a fake music supervisor

Scams in sync are common enough that companies now publish warnings. Tunefind says scammers have used its name to promise placements, sometimes with fake licence agreements and references to real shows, even though Tunefind doesn't accept submissions or represent artists. MassiveMusic, part of Songtradr, describes fake supervisor profiles with AI-generated headshots, cloned voices on calls, and convincing fake sync portals.

Red flags:

  • They ask for money. A "review fee", "registration fee", "processing fee" or a fee to guarantee a placement. Nobody can sell you a placement. MassiveMusic's rule: legitimate sync licensing never requires upfront payment.
  • They came to you, with a big claim. An unsolicited message saying your song is wanted for a major show, from someone you've never heard of.
  • No details. No client, no project, no usage, no timeline, no fee range.
  • Pressure. "Today only", "exclusive window", "sign now".
  • Look-alike addresses. A free email account or a slightly altered domain using a real company's name (MassiveMusic gives an example in its warning).
  • Odd channels. Instagram DMs instead of email from a company domain.
  • A contract that takes too much: exclusive rights to your whole catalogue, or ownership of your master, in exchange for "exposure".

Not every request is a scam, though. In a VI-Control thread, a composer asked whether a supervisor he'd met on LinkedIn was safe after she asked for tracks with metadata and the names of the master and publishing owners. Experienced members thought it looked legitimate, since that is exactly what a supervisor needs to clear music, and suggested checking her credits and talking on a call first. The test that came out of the thread is a good one: if the other party is asking you for money, that is probably their business model.

What to do if something feels off: check their credits on IMDb or their company's website, write to the company at an address you find yourself (not the one in the message), never send money or personal details, and if a company's name is being used, tell them. Tunefind, for example, asks people to forward these emails to its help address.

Pitching with Aerie

If you pitch regularly, Aerie does most of this for you. A share link streams and downloads without the recipient creating an account, and it shows you who opened it, what they played and who listened to the end, so you know whether a follow-up makes sense instead of guessing. Supervisors can request a licence straight from the page, and each track's Sync Passport keeps the one-stop status, splits, ISRC and licensing contact you need to answer clearance questions on the spot.

To save time on the next one, use the free Pitch email template and follow-up rules (PDF and spreadsheet): the cold and brief emails, the follow-up, a pre-send checklist, a pitch tracker and the scam red flags. Download the Pitch email template and follow-up rules.

Frequently asked questions

Should I send MP3 or WAV files to a music supervisor?

Send a link to a high-quality MP3 (320 kbps is the usual choice) that streams and downloads, and keep WAVs ready for when they ask. Don't attach either to the email.

How long should I wait before following up with a music supervisor?

About two weeks, then send one short follow-up in the same thread, ideally with something new such as an instrumental or a cutdown. If there's still no reply, stop and pitch the next relevant track later.

How many songs should I send to a music supervisor?

For a cold email, one or two strong, relevant tracks. For a brief, whatever it asks for; if it doesn't say, a short focused playlist (one experienced supervisor suggests about ten).

What does one-stop mean in a sync pitch?

It means one person or company controls both the recording (master) and the composition (publishing), so a single licence clears the track. Supervisors value it because it saves time, so mention it in the pitch if it is true.

Do real music supervisors ever charge to listen to music?

A supervisor working on a production is paid by the production, not by you. A fee to review, register or guarantee a placement is a classic red flag; nobody can sell you a placement.

Sources

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