The Swedish Songwriting Giant: A Conversation with Lina Heyman

Sweden has been exporting music around the globe for decades. Lina Heyman thinks she knows why.

If you enjoy this newsletter, consider ordering a copy of my debut book, Uncharted Territory: What Numbers Tell Us about the Biggest Hit Songs and Ourselves. It’s a data-driven history of popular music covering 1958 to 2025.

Today’s newsletter is the latest edition in our interview series. Today, I am talking to Lina Heyman, acting CEO of STIM, the largest collection society in Sweden. I wanted to talk with Heyman because (a) I don’t think most people realize how important collection societies are for getting songwriters paid and (b) from ABBA to Max Martin, Sweden has been exporting music around the globe for decades. Check out our conversation below.

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Because not everybody reading this newsletter will be familiar, can you tell me what a collecting society is and what that means for STIM?

A collecting society makes sure that songwriters are paid whenever their music is creating value. That could be for if their music is streaming or performed in concert or a bunch of other things. We make sure the people who wrote that song get a share of the value.

STIM has been around for 100 years in Sweden. It is our home market, but we also make sure to collect revenues when music travels around the world to make sure our Swedish partners are getting paid.

So, you are focused on compositions rather than recordings?

Exactly. We focus on songs and the people that create them, like composers, lyricists, and authors.

While you process collections for songwriters, do you also do so for performance rights organizations or publishers?

Yes. We have publishers in our society as well as songwriters. That’s part of our infrastructure.

How large is the STIM catalog?

We currently represent over 110,000 songwriters.

Safe to say that results in you representing millions of compositions?

Yes! Over 2 million.

You mentioned how you process both collections inside and outside of Sweden for Swedish artists. From ABBA and Roxette to Max Martin and Tove Lo, Sweden has a long history of exporting music around the globe. Why do you think Sweden has such a rich musical culture as compared to other similar countries?