Partner Ross Charap has been selected as a Billboard Top Music Lawyer of 2025, making this the fourth consecutive year he has received the accolade. The awards, issued by Billboard, serve to highlight the “savviest legal counselors throughout the music industry,” focusing on both dealmakers and litigators alike. The April 2025 edition of Billboard Magazine features the following profile on Ross:
(p.66) Charap recently moved from the firm ArentFox Schiff to Barton, where he advises BMG Rights Management U.S., Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, and the estates of Billy Preston, Harold Arlen, Jessye Norman and pioneering hip-hop producer Larry Smith Sr., among others. Along with his former partner, ArentFox Schiff’s Matthew Finkelstein, Charap says, “On behalf of the Stones and BMG, my team successfully challenged a distribution rule of the Mechanical Licensing Collective that resulted in terminated publishers continuing to receive MLC royalties after their rights had been terminated.” After intervention by the U.S. Copyright Office (which oversees the MLC), “all writers or their families who have exercised their termination rights will receive all post-termination royalties,” Charap says, “as well as a refund of all such royalties previously misdirected.”
You can learn more about Ross, his practice, and some of his high-profile clients at the links below:
“Rolling Stones IP Attorney and Music Industry Veteran Ross J. Charap Joins Barton from ArentFox Schiff.” Barton LLP. (April 8, 2025).
“ArentFox Schiff Loses Rolling Stones IP Atty To Barton.” Law360. (April 8, 2025).
“Executive Turntable: Board Buildups at ASCAP and iHeart, Plus a Rolling Stone Lawyer Joins Barton.” Billboard. (April 4, 2025).
Ross J. Charap