Somerville, Mass. - Major record label Universal Music Group’s Island Def Jam group on Thursday announced a partnership with music application developer The Echo Nest, to allow developers to access the Island Def Jam (IDJ) catalog in their applications. Announced during Digital Media Wire’s Digital Music Forum East event in New York, the deal will give music application developers access to IDJ songs, without the need to negotiate licenses with Universal.

In return, IDJ becomes the publisher of any resulting apps, handling any payments to music publishers, and will split any revenues with the developer, and the Echo Nest.

"This is a bold move on the part of Island Def Jam, which has become the first major label business department to embrace an open development ecosystem to attract the best and brightest developers," said Echo Nest CEO Jim Lucchese.

The Application Programming Interface (API) for IDJ songs is expected to be released by the Echo Nest soon, IDJ senior VP of digital and business development Jon Vanhala told Billboard, which reports the deal took a year to be approved by top executives at Universal.

Related Links:

http://tinyurl.com/4jvqecq

http://tinyurl.com/4jb8pt4 (Billboard)

http://the.echonest.com

http://digitalmusicforum.com/east/