Because we do not own the music, we need to write a letter to the copyright holders of the track we are going to use in order to get their permission to use it. In this case we wrote a letter to the Universal Music Group - producers of Drake's album 'Thank Me Later'. The letter can be seen below.
Dear Universal Music Group,
I am a representative of a student media project in which we wish to use the track 'Fireworks' from the album 'Thank Me Later' by Drake.
The project involves creating a music video for the track, as well as producing an album cover and magazine advertisement for the artist.
With your permission, this track would only be used in an educational context and be viewed by my media class, my teacher and the OCR exam board moderator. It will not be uploaded to any public video websites.
Of course, the artist and your company will be fully recognised and credited throughout the pre-production and the final video itself. A copyright notice, with wording supplied by you, can be included in the records of this project. If this is required please send full details.
I look forward to hearing from you
Regards,
Dan Myles
[Above is a screen-grab of the email to Universal Music Group]