2010s
It was ranked in 2010 by Music & Copyright as the world's third-largest music publisher.[25] Among the songs in the company's library are "Winter Wonderland" and formerly "Happy Birthday to You" until the copyright of the song was invalidated in 2015 and put into public domain the next year.[26]
In January 2011, Cameron Strang, founder of New West Records and Southside Independent Music Publishing, was named CEO of Warner Chappell Music.[27] He was succeeded by former company president Jon Platt in 2016.[28]
Warner Chappell acquired Frank Gari's studio in 2015, adding to its production music library some of the most well-known television news music themes including those for local stations owned by ABC, CBS, and NBC.[29]
On June 30, 2017, Warner Chappell Music filed a lawsuit against EMI Music Publishing, accusing the latter company of underpaying Warner Music for the royalties of the 20th Century Fox catalogue, which Warner acquired in 1982, as well as the rights to Curtis Mayfield and Kool and the Gang. This controversy arises from EMI's acquisition of Robbins and Feist in the early 1990s.[30]
On January 9, 2019, Guy Moot was named CEO of Warner Chappell Music. He and Carianne Marshall, the company's COO, were appointed co-chairs.[31]
On January 15, 2019, Warner Chappell Music filed a monetization claim against a fan film created by Star Wars YouTube channel Star Wars Theory but rescinded the claim two days later after intervention by Lucasfilm Ltd. on behalf of outraged fans.[32][33] In May 2019, Warner Chappell Music was again criticized for filing overly broad copyright claims, concerning a large number of YouTube videos by Minecraft YouTuber Mumbo Jumbo, who has more than 9 million subscribers, for the sole reason that the intro song on all of them contained samples of a song that was copyrighted by Warner Chappell Music. The YouTuber had paid for a license to use the song, but it turned out that the samples had not been cleared. He stated that he intended to dispute Warner Chappell Music's claims, but that their large number (around 1800) would make this burdensome.[34]
In May 2019, Warner Chappell acquired the Gene Autry Music Group, comprising four music publishers, 1,500 compositions (including "Back in the Saddle Again", "Here Comes Santa Claus", "Just Walkin' in the Rain", and "You Belong To Me"), and several of Autry's master recordings.[35]
