Founded by Bernhard Schott in Mainz in 1770, the Schott Music group today ranks among the leading music and media publishers in the world with branches in major international markets in 10 countries. Since then, the company has added a wide range of products and services covering all aspects of music to the traditional music publishing business.

Schott’s own service and logistics centre, music distribution services GmbH (mds), distributes not only the products from the entire Schott programme but also the publications of more than 120 third-party publishers. About 130,000 titles (scores, books, recordings), stored in a modern high-bay warehouse that currently houses more than 13 million items, are shipped from Mainz worldwide every year.

Among the companies of the Schott group are not only traditional publishing houses such as Schott Music Panton, Ars Viva, Ernst Eulenburg & Co., Atlantis, Hohner, Fürstner, and Cranz, but also two internationally renowned record labels, Wergo and Intuition, distributing contemporary, jazz and world music on CD. The group also publishes seven specialist magazines, including Neue Zeitschrift für Musik founded by Robert Schumann. Schott supplies theatres and orchestras throughout the world with performance material of about 10,000 stage and concert works. The programme of Schott Music, comprising performance and teaching literature, urtext editions, concert and opera editions, study scores, complete editions such as those of Richard Wagner and Robert Schumann, books on music, and CDs, influences all areas of musical activities. The Digital Media department of Schott opens up new innovative digital product fields and distribution areas by offering music apps, e-books and e-scores.

A main focus of the publishing programme is the publication of works by contemporary 20th- and 21st-century composers. Internationally renowned composers such as Carl Orff, Igor Stravinsky, Michael Tippett, Paul Hindemith, György Ligeti, Krzysztof Penderecki, Hans Werner Henze and Aribert Reimann entrusted Schott with the publication of their works. Today as before, Schott Music seeks to support and promote young composers throughout the world as part of its cultural mandate, such as Jörg Widmann, Christian Jost, Thierry Pécou, Chaya Czernowin, Atsuhiko Gondai, Fazil Say, and Andrew Norman.

Schott Music is a modern family-owned company. Directors Dr Peter Hanser-Strecker (as shareholder) and Dr. Thomas Sertl are shaping the profile of Schott Music. They are supported by an international team of about 180 professionals working in the areas of editing, production and distribution, creating new music repertoire together with the composers, giving new impetus to musical life and satisfying customer demands from all over the world.