{"id":253306,"date":"2026-03-19T09:29:03","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T09:29:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/?p=253306"},"modified":"2026-03-19T09:29:03","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T09:29:03","slug":"primary-wave-partners-with-estate-of-eartha-kitt-acquiring-music-catalog-and-name-likeness-rights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/primary-wave-partners-with-estate-of-eartha-kitt-acquiring-music-catalog-and-name-likeness-rights\/","title":{"rendered":"Primary Wave partners with estate of Eartha Kitt, acquiring music catalog and name & likeness rights"},"content":{"rendered":"

Primary Wave Music has partnered with the estate of Eartha Kitt and her daughter, Kitt Shapiro, in a deal covering the singer and actress’s catalog of music, plus her name, image, and likeness rights.<\/p>\n

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.<\/p>\n

Kitt, who died on December 25, 2008, at the age of 81, was known for her recording career spanning several decades, which produced hits including Santa Baby<\/em>, C’est Si Bon<\/em>, and Let’s Do It<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Santa Baby<\/em>, written for Kitt in 1953, has close to 500 million streams on Spotify alone, according to Primary Wave.<\/p>\n

The deal also includes hit recordings such as Under the Bridges of Paris<\/em> and Where Is My Man<\/em> \u2013 the latter of which earned Kitt her first Gold record.<\/p>\n

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Primary Wave says that Kitt’s catalog encompasses 17 studio albums, 8 live albums, and more than 50 singles.<\/p>\n

Kitt Shapiro, Eartha’s only child and the Executrix of her estate, said: “I am very excited to partner with Primary Wave to further share my mother’s legacy, and to continue spreading her message of kindness, love, acceptance and empowerment, to future generations.”<\/p>\n

Primary Wave’s Dana DuFine added: “Eartha Kitt was a true icon with one of the most distinctive voices in music.<\/p>\n

“We are thrilled to partner with Eartha’s daughter, Kitt Shapiro, and are honored she has entrusted us to preserve the legacy of her mother’s legendary catalog of music.”<\/p>\n

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The deal is the latest in a steady run of estate and heritage catalog acquisitions for Primary Wave, which describes itself as “the leading independent publisher of iconic and legendary music in the world”.<\/p>\n

Primary Wave’s acquisition activity has been powered by a $2 billion partnership<\/a> with Brookfield Asset Management, struck in 2022, which saw the financial giant take a minority stake in the New York-headquartered publisher founded and led by Larry Mestel.<\/p>\n

Since being founded in 2006, Primary Wave has built a portfolio that includes rights to music from Bob Marley, Prince, Whitney Houston, Stevie Nicks, James Brown, Smokey Robinson, Ray Charles, Burt Bacharach, and Aerosmith, among others.<\/p>\n

Last year, the company confirmed<\/a> it had acquired a stake in the Notorious B.I.G.’s recordings and publishing catalog, plus name, image, and likeness rights, in a deal that valued the late rapper’s estate at over $200 million.<\/p>\n

Primary Wave is also reportedly in talks<\/a> to acquire Kobalt Music Group, in a deal that\u00a0would create one of the largest independent music rights companies in the world.<\/p>\n

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Born on January 17, 1927, in North, South Carolina, Kitt rose from a childhood marked by hardship to become one of the most recognized entertainers of the 20th century. She began her career dancing with the Katherine Dunham Company, later becoming a star through her performances in Paris cabarets. Orson Welles once called her “the most exciting woman in the world”.<\/p>\n

Kitt’s career spanned Broadway (including Tony-nominated turns in Timbuktu!<\/em> and The Wild Party<\/em>), film, and television \u2013 where she played Catwoman in the third season of Batman<\/em> in 1967.<\/p>\n

She won two Daytime Emmy Awards for voicing the villain Yzma in the Disney series The Emperor’s New School<\/em>, and a third Emmy posthumously in 2010.<\/p>\n

In 1968, Kitt’s outspoken criticism of the Vietnam War at a White House luncheon effectively saw her blacklisted in the United States for years. When she returned to American stages in the late 1970s, audiences welcomed her back.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Deal includes the singer’s 17 studio albums, eight live albums and more than 50 singles, including Santa Baby.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":253308,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[129698,135147,233,129181],"class_list":["post-253306","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-catalog","tag-eartha-kitt","tag-primary-wave","tag-primary-wave-music"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253306","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=253306"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253306\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":253389,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/253306\/revisions\/253389"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/253308"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=253306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=253306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=253306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}