International Standard Musical Work Code

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

Format

Each code is composed of three parts:

  1. prefix element (1 character)
  2. work identifier (9 digits)
  3. check digit (1 digit)

Currently, the only prefix defined is "T," indicating Musical works. However, additional prefixes may be defined in the future to expand the available range of identifiers and/or expand the system to additional types of works.

Computation of the check digit

With

  • : one of the nine digits of the work identifier (i=1 to 9) from left to right.
  • : check digit.

Example: T-034.524.680-C

ISWC identifiers are commonly written the form T-123.456.789-C. The grouping is for easy reading only; the numbers do not incorporate information about the work's region, author, publisher, etc. Rather, they are simply issued in sequence. These separators are not required, and no other separators are allowed.

The first ISWC was assigned in 1995, for the song "Dancing Queen" by ABBA; the code is T-000.000.001-0.

Usage

To register an ISWC, the following minimal information 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 collecting society administration and identify works in legal contracts. It would also be useful in library cataloguing.

See also

References

Uses material from the Wikipedia article International Standard Musical Work Code, released under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license.