International Standard Musical Work Code

International Standard Musical Work Code (ISWC) is a unique identifier for musical works, similar to ISBN. It is adopted as international standard ISO 15707. Responsible is TC 46/SC 9.

Format:
# prefix T (prefix may be changed)
# 9 digits
# 1 check digit

The first ISWC was assigned in 1995, for the song "Dancing Queen" by ABBA; the code is T-000000001-0.

To register an ISWC, the following minimal metadata must be supplied:
* title
* names of all composers, arrangers and authors, with their role in the piece (identified by role code) and their CAE/IPI number
* work classification code (CIS)
* identification of other works it is a derivative of

Note: an ISWC identifies works, not recordings. ISRC can be used to identify recordings. Nor does it identify individual publications (e.g. issues of a recording on physical media, sheet music, broadcast at a particular frequency/modulation/time/location...)

Its primary purpose is in collecting society administration, and to clearly identify works in legal contracts. It would also be useful in library cataloguing.

Due to the fact that a musical work can have multiple authors, it is inevitable that, on rare occasions, a duplicate ISWC might exist and might not be detected immediately. Because of the existing business practices among collecting societies, it is not possible to simply declare an ISWC as obsolete. In such cases, as soon as they are identified, the system will deal with duplicate registrations by linking such registration records in the ISWC database and its related products. [http://www.collectionscanada.ca/iso/tc46sc9/docs/sc9n298.pdf]

ee also

*GRid

External links

* [http://www.iswc.org/ The registration authority]
* [http://www.collectionscanada.ca/iso/tc46sc9/15707.htm TC 46 SC 9 website]
* http://www.iswc.org/en/html/Agencies.html
* [http://iswcnet.cisac.org look up at iswcnet.cisac.org]