US jury found singer Ed Sheeran did not plagiarise Marvin Gaye's 'Let's Get It On' in composing his hit 'Thinking Out Loud'.
NEW YORK — British pop phenom Ed Sheeran expressed joy and relief on Thursday after a US jury found he did not plagiarise Marvin Gaye's"Let's Get It On" in composing his hit"Thinking Out Loud", calling the ruling a win for creative freedom.
The civil lawsuit was filed by the heirs of Gaye’s co-writer Ed Townsend, who alleged that harmonic progressions and rhythmic elements of Sheeran's song were lifted without permission from the classic made famous by Gaye."If the jury had decided this matter the other way, we might as well say goodbye to the creative freedom of songwriters," Mr Sheeran told reporters.
Mr Sheeran spent days testifying with guitar in hand, playing demos for the court to prove the 1-3-4-5 chord progression in question is a basic building block of pop music that can't be owned. "These chords are common building blocks," Mr Sheeran said on Thursday."They are a songwriter's 'alphabet', our tool kit."Plaintiff Kathryn Townsend Griffin left the court and breezed by reporters smoking what appeared to be a cigarillo, saying only:"God is good all the time, all the time God is good."Industry insiders closely followed the copyright lawsuit as some feared it could chill songwriters' creativity and open the door to future litigation.
That result in 2015 surprised many in the industry, including legal experts, who considered many of the musical components cited as foundational, and existing largely in the public domain.
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