Atlanta megaproducer Jermaine Dupri alleges Sony owes him $18M in royalties
Atlanta producer and rapper Jermaine Dupri has filed a lawsuit seeking $18 million from Sony Music Entertainment, claiming the company withheld royalties and didn’t honor its agreements with him and his record label So So Def.
The federal lawsuit, filed Monday in the Southern District of New York, claims Sony has a “systemic pattern” of underreporting and failing to report royalties, as well as altering statements to report previously earned royalties. The royalties in dispute are in connection with albums recorded by artists who were signed to So So Def, including Xscape and Da Brat, as well as Dupri’s production work for artists such as Mariah Carey and Usher.
Representatives for Sony Music Entertainment did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Christopher Brown, Dupri’s lawyer, declined to comment.
Dupri founded So So Def in Atlanta in the early 1990s. The label would help to shape the city as a musical hot spot in the 1990s and early 2000s. Its roster of artists include Xscape, 3LW, Jagged Edge, Bow Wow and Kris Kross. Under the label’s banner, Dupri also produced hits for Carey, Usher and, more recently, Muni Long.
In the 2010s, the label primarily functioned as a production arm instead of releasing new music and signing new artists. But in April of last year, Dupri announced So So Def entered a distribution deal with Hybe America, which gives the label the opportunity to launch new artists.
Dupri’s recordings have produced more than $200 million in gross revenue over the last 32 years, according to the complaint.
So So Def has maintained a contractual and business relationship with Sony for about three decades. In 1992, So So Def signed a label agreement with Sony to sign performers to recording agreements. The royalties payable to producers of the recordings within that agreement were capped at 8% of sales, and such royalties would be treated as an advance. The cap would be amended to 6% in 1994.
Five years later, the two companies struck a joint venture to form a new label called GANY Records, according to the suit. Dupri would receive a set royalty rate of 8% for production services provided to signed artists under the joint venture and 2% for remixing services, according to the filing.
Sony would eventually buyout So So Def’s stake, whereafter it would no longer receive any share of Dupri’s producer royalties. In 2003, So So Def signed a label agreement with Arista Records, which the two groups terminated the following year, as well as a producer agreement, which was amended twice.
In 2023, Dupri began to suspect that Sony had not paid all of the royalties for multiple releases, but didn’t understand the full extent of the company’s “tactics” until receiving an audit from a financial services firm in 2025, according to the complaint.
Dupri and So So Def claim they are owed about $960,000 on Xscape’s 1993 album “Hummin’ Comin’ at ‘Cha” and $1 million on Da Brat’s 1994 album “Funkdafied.” The lawsuit also alleged that Sony never reported producer royalties or override royalties for Dupri’s services rendered on the first two albums by Kris Kross until 2023, and $2.2 million is still owed.
Additionally, the filing claims Sony started reporting previously unreported royalties on Jagged Edge’s 1997 album “The Jagged Era” in 2023. However, the sales periods for the previously unreported royalties only go back as far as 2007. Dupri and So So Def allege millions of dollars are owed and that Sony tried to conceal the fact that additional money was due and altered royalty statements going back multiple years.