Music for your dance school, without Buma and Sena
If you are looking for music for your dance school, RadioMatic gives you your own station for each room, with its own style and tempo for every class and your own announcements in the hall. Because the music is generated entirely by AI, no payment is due to Buma/Stemra and Sena.
With RadioMatic from € 29.99 per location per month, without Buma and Sena. News and your own announcements with Professional. See all plans
What do you pay now for music in your dance school?
Three questions, and you see what you now spend on Buma/Stemra, Sena and your music service.
How big is your business?
What else you get
Every class its own music A dance school plays different music all week long. The toddler class on Wednesday afternoon, street dance on Thursday evening, ballroom on Friday. That music now usually comes from a phone, or from lists a teacher put together.
Stays put when a teacher leaves When that teacher stops, the lists walk out of the door with them. With RadioMatic you fix a style and a tempo range per room and per class block, and the station fills in the tracks. That stays put, even when someone else is in front of the group. And it does not become a worn-out list, because new music arrives every day.
Announcements for waiting parents In the hall and the canteen something else happens. Parents wait there and pupils hang around between two classes. The DJ moments name your school and play what you type in. For instance that enrolment for the show is open, that there are taster classes in September or that the room is hired out on Sundays. Then you no longer have to write it on a board nobody looks at. A news round on the hour with the weather alongside is something you can switch on or leave out.
No ads from another school Advertising from others never comes in between, so the dance school in the next town is not advertising in your hall. With more rooms or more locations you run everything from a single dashboard, with its own mood for each room and its own announcements for each location.
What does music in your dance school cost, and which table applies to your rooms?
Lower category, per square metre Buma/Stemra places a dance school in the lower of the two categories of the tariff for mechanical background music. That is because the closed list in the binding tariff text names sports spaces without a hospitality facility. There you pay per square metre, in brackets. Sena has its own table for the same group, also per square metre. The amounts above come out of those two tables.
A dance room is not background With a dance school there is one point you cannot skip. Those two tables are about background music. The tariff provisions describe that as music played at a constant sound level that does not come to the foreground, and in a dance room music is not that. For this Sena has a separate surcharge for foreground music at movement classes, and it is not in the amounts above.
Ask about it in writing Buma/Stemra writes that the fee for foreground music at movement classes is always calculated separately for the spaces where classes are given. The notes to that surcharge name Zumba, Les Mills and Bodypump as examples. Dance classes are named in so many words by neither organisation. So which table applies to your rooms is something to ask about in writing before you make a declaration.
No fees for AI-made music With RadioMatic no payment is due to Buma/Stemra or Sena, because the music is made entirely with AI. Buma/Stemra itself says that music made entirely by AI, without a creative contribution from a person, does not qualify for copyright or payment.
What the law and the court say The same applies to Sena. Sena can only collect for a recording that has been commercially released, and on that ground Sena lost in court in 2025. The full reasoning is in our legal memorandum.
| Buma/Stemra | € 569 |
|---|---|
| Sena, including the RAAP-PPI surcharge | € 701 |
| Together per year | € 1,270 |
Sources: Buma/Stemra, mechanical background music tariff sheet BUM.413.26/01, category B, the binding tariff text BUM.129.26/01 article 7 and the definition of background music, which reads “muziek die ten gehore wordt gebracht op een constant en niet op de voorgrond tredend geluidsniveau” (music played at a constant sound level that does not come to the foreground), Buma/Stemra on fitness centres and gyms, which carries the line “Gaat het om voorgrondmuziek bij bewegingslessen? Dan berekenen wij de vergoeding altijd afzonderlijk voor de ruimtes waarin les wordt gegeven.” (Is it foreground music at movement classes? Then we always calculate the fee separately for the spaces where classes are given.), and Sena, 2026 tariff overview, page 12, table Sportscholen / fitnesscentra. Both scales run by floor area up to 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1,600 m². The surcharge for foreground music is in a separate table on page 13, with Zumba, Les Mills and Bodypump in the notes, and is not in the amounts above. Amounts per year and base tariff, Buma/Stemra excluding VAT, Sena exempt from VAT and here including the RAAP-PPI surcharge of 26.6%. Details of other providers from their own sites, consulted on 23 September 2026. Also used ECLI:NL:RBGEL:2025:6175.
Per room, per class, and at the tempo the class asks for
Tempo is a technical choice here In a dance room the music is the material being worked with. Tempo is a technical choice there. A class built on 128 beats per minute runs aground on a track at 96. Teachers solve that now with lists of their own, and those go out of the door with a teacher who stops. With RadioMatic you fix a style and a tempo range per class block in the dashboard. What plays in room two on Thursday evening then no longer depends on whose phone is on the cable.
Street dance and ballroom differ The rooms do not ask for the same thing either. With street dance the emphasis is on the pulse and it can be low and direct. With ballroom the time signature leads, and it has to stay audible through the whole room. If you work with set dances at a set tempo, as in advanced ballroom, your teacher’s own list is still the safest choice. RadioMatic is then for the hall, the canteen and the freer classes.
Nothing to switch between classes With a toddler or infant class volume is what you watch most. A class in bare feet on a dance floor calls for something other than a class in shoes. You set that per room and run it from the same dashboard, so nobody has to switch anything in the quarter of an hour between two classes.
Announcements belong in the hall In the hall and the canteen it is the other way round. Parents wait there, pupils hang around and enrolments are taken. There you do want an even background and room for spoken announcements. An announcement about the show or the taster classes lands better there than on a poster. In the room you switch off everything that speaks and keep the music alone.
It works on the installation already in place
No engineer and no new hardware You do not have to replace anything. In most dance schools there is a set of active speakers or an amplifier with a mixing desk in each room, often with a connection for a phone or laptop. That is where the stream goes in through line-in. If you have Sonos or a Chromecast in the hall, the stream plays on that. A browser on the computer at the desk is enough to start. No engineer has to come out and no new hardware is needed.
Every room its own sound You can have something different playing in each room and each space, and you run all of it from the same dashboard. With more locations each school keeps its own mood and announcements under one account. You hear back within one working day, and after that your station is live in under ten minutes.
What you can choose from today
No provider for dance schools Look for music for your dance school and you will not find a provider with a page for dance schools. You end up with the sport and fitness offering from Tunify, Synerplay, Backsound and Trend Music. That is made for a room where music is the background, while for you the music is the class.
Two extra bills And with all of them you are playing music by human creators. That means two extra bills, from Buma/Stemra and from Sena. Tunify says itself that for commercial use or in a public environment you need a public performance licence of your own from your local copyright organisation. What that costs is set out above.
With RadioMatic every room in your dance school gets a fixed tempo and its own style per class block, from the toddler class on Wednesday afternoon to street dance on Thursday evening. What plays then no longer depends on whose phone is on the cable. In the hall, waiting parents hear your own announcements between the tracks, such as enrolment for the show or the taster classes in September.
Why RadioMatic is something other than a playlist or the radio
A business owner who wants music on the premises usually picks from three things. A playlist from a streaming service, an ordinary radio station, or a royalty-free music package. This is where they differ.
| Playlist | Ordinary radio | Royalty-free | RadioMatic | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New music | Fixed list | Yes, but not your choice | Limited catalogue | New every day |
| Music that is yours alone | No | No | No | Yes, your own hits |
| Fits the time of day | Switch it yourself | No | Switch it yourself | Automatic |
| Names your business | No | No | No | Yes |
| Your own offers | No | Only if you buy advertising | No | Yes, with Professional, no studio |
| Local news and weather | No | Yes, the station’s | No | Yes, with Professional, your town |
| Other people’s adverts | No | Yes | No | No |
| Several locations | Set up per location | No | Set up per location | Yes, from one place, each with its own mood |
| Buma/Stemra and Sena | Payable | Payable | See the terms | Not payable |
Frequently asked questions about music in your dance school
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- Background music for your wellness centre, without Buma and SenaWellness centres, sauna and spa
Background music for business. What is allowed, what does it cost and what are your options?
Ready to hear it for yourself?
Try RadioMatic free for 14 days. Your own station for your business, without Buma/Stemra and Sena, and cancel monthly if you pay monthly.
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