MTV Is Subject of Antitrust Complaint

Veteran music-television executive Don Cornelius complained in a letter to the U.S. Justice Department Tuesday that Viacom Inc.’s MTV cable channel is violating antitrust laws by restricting artists who perform on its “Video Music Awards.”

The letter accused MTV of pressuring acts booked for the awards show to skip opportunities to perform on other programs, such as Cornelius’ “Soul Train Lady of Soul Awards” program.

The letter contended that MTV’s policy is “flagrantly anti-competitive” and said that the cable channel “can decree at any moment that any recording artist who disobeys MTV rules shall have no music videos played for . . . any period MTV should prescribe on either MTV, VH1 or BET, all of which are wholly owned Viacom properties.”

Cornelius’ complaint comes the same week as MTV’s unusual decision to make an exception to the policy. MTV said Thursday that singer Alicia Keys, who had been scheduled to perform on the “Video Music Awards” Sept. 6, also may perform on Cornelius’ program, which airs starting Sept. 1.

Cornelius said he had tried numerous times without success in recent weeks to book Keys, whose debut album on J Records has sold an estimated 1.6 million copies in the two months since its release.

J Records executives had been pushing MTV to make an exception to the policy and allow Keys to perform on Cornelius’ show before he aired his complaints, sources said. Representatives of the label declined to comment.

MTV executives said this month that they required Keys and other acts on the “Video Music Awards” to agree not to perform on competing programs during the 30 days preceding the events. But an MTV spokeswoman said Thursday that the executives “want as many people as possible to enjoy her music.”

“With respect to her booking on the MTV ‘Video Music Awards,’ exclusivity is standard practice within the print and broadcast media industry, and to think otherwise would be naive,” the spokeswoman said. She added that video airplay on MTV and Viacom’s other channels is not contingent upon an artist’s agreeing to appear on the awards show.

The exception to the policy follows an Aug. 17 story in The Times in which Cornelius complained that MTV was using its power to dissuade acts from performing on competitors’ programs.

Many record executives lament the practice of blocking acts from performing on multiple shows, saying it could reduce an artist’s total audience. The practice, they say, is routine in the annual tug-of-war between the Grammy Awards and the American Music Awards.

Cornelius said he has never required such agreements from artists.